The Salient
by JasonJustJason
Summary: Great Door Fantasy Online became available to the public one decade after the death game Sword Art Online. Looking to be the first successful VR game in existence GDFO has a lot to offer and live up to. Brian and friends eager for the launch, are horrified to find themselves trapped in the second death game in history. (T for lime.) (In heavy revision!)
1. Time Crunch

**Hey, hey guys my name is Jason and today I'm going to be uploading my first chapter, of my first story so please be gentle with me. This story is going to be driven by OC's, straight up Original Characters, so if you don't like that you're in the wrong place. Flames will be ignored; constructive criticism is appreciated and besides all that please enjoy the first chapter of The Salient.**

 **Updated Note: This first chapter is essentially a PROLOGUE, an introduction to the main cast, and with that being said this chapter can technically be skipped. Its purpose is largely reference. Of course it's also a legitimate chapter of the story, so bear all this in mind while reading it. And if you do skip be sure to come back and give it a read!**

 **Chapter 1: Time Crunch**

Brian or Thrumaticus 'Thrum' Thomil

October 7th, 2032

Brian Steele awoke with a start in his plush queen-sized bed. A piercing screech cutting into his babble of nonsense.

"What the hell-" The loud noise cut in again.

Still only half-awake Brian swung his arm to the side and slammed down on the digital clock lying on the banister at his side, failing to silence the contraption.

"Brian turn that damn thing off!" A dark-skinned boy yelled barging into Brian's room, with no shirt or shoes on to his name.

"Shut up." Brian refused to acknowledge his brother further. Reaching over he unplugged his alarm clock, foregoing the snooze button. "You know today is the day-"

"Stop talking, get out my room, and yes l know today's the day the game comes out." Brian rubbed the sleepiness out of his eyes and sat up. Swinging his legs over the edge of his bed, (purposefully away from his sibling), he then threw on a pair of navy blue baggy sweat pants and a matching navy blue shirt.

 _Goodness my breath is hot garbage!_

Smiling at the sound of his door closing, Brian threw on a pair of slightly used socks and a new pair of sneakers, stretching his frame taunt and yawning Brian is out of his room and running through his morning routine with a bit more pep than usual.

He brushed his teeth with one hand and combed his thick hair with the other. Dark skin, black hair, and a pair of expressive coal eyes. At the impressive height of six feet two inches, Brian would say he's imposing, but his lithe frame voices the opposite.

Slipping out of the bathroom of the near empty house he jogged downstairs, heading for the front door.

Today is the day.

 _Today is the day l get my hands on the new VR game Great Door Fantasy Online. The multiplayer game that people are waiting with baited breath to get their hands on at stores all over the country right now. A game launched a decade after the Death Game._

New platform! Better graphics! As well as a new engine that can house multiple times as many people as the first game simultaneously on a single server! The game that drops today at 5pm, the game that Brian has no doubt in his mind that he's going to get his hands on.

Checking his watch Brian smiled. Sliding outside of his parent's house his smile didn't drop for a second.

Half of a mile down the road is a plaza, in that plaza is a GameStop that Brian's friend Tball works in. That's where he's headed, walking with a step bordering a speed walk, and a smile on his face ready to break into a grin.

Raising his hand he admired the weather. _Shame l won't be able to enjoy this amazing cool weather, with the game coming out I doubt I'll get much real world for a long while._ Brian noted.

 _It's 4:05 pm and its not oppressively hot, a real nice day for a walk too._

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Tball or Tball Skulls

4:05! Timothy 'Tball' Ballins, is the GM of his local GameStop, and he is stressed. You'd think that after working here for five plus years that he would be used to the hectic nature of fresh releases.

Or that he would factor in just how lazy his employees could be when its crunch time and he needs them at their best. In the end he didn't and now he's dealing with the repercussive effects of that mistake.

"Jared, move that rack of gift cards back, we want to funnel them in that direction!" Tball corrected.

"My bad." Jared is the new guy.

"Alright l want the rest of this finished up in the next five minutes, I'll be in the back!" Tball had been saying that all morning. From eight in the morning to now four something.

Tball walked briskly to the back of the store behind the symmetrical racks and clean counters. Turning the light on in the bathroom Tball checked himself out and freshened up before they opened shop to the absurdly long line of people all trying to get their hands on a tiny black chip with the label Great Door Fantasy Online plastered on its box.

Peaking outside of the claustrophobic washroom Tball watched his staff work silently, yep about a half-dozen bodies all accounted for, performing some menial task of some sort.

When Tball ducked back into the bathroom at least half of the people who were 'working' stop doing what they were doing.

Tball stared at himself in the mirror.

Ebony skin and a ruggedly handsome face. Cornrows going down Tball's head in neat lateral lines, and a permanent pair of dark glasses. He understands the term "Look good, feel good" and forever lives that phrase.

Peeling off his shades and revealing his face, something that he never lets anyone get the privilege of seeing, Tball ran the water and rinsed his face. A quick leak later and Tball left the bathroom (with glasses on of course) to enter the storage room in the very back of the building.

Sliding aside a life-sized COD poster, Tball glanced down to the smallish briefcase behind it filled with close to a dozen dark chips. GDFO is the label displayed proudly on each chip respectively.

Opening the case Tball made sure that all of the VR games are in order and slipped the case shut. Replacing the poster back to its original place.

Checking his cheap and practical watch on his wrist, Tball found it to be 4:12pm.

Walking back into the business portion of the store Tball was happy to see how much more clean it was since yesterday, his slight perfectionist streak speaking for itself though his smile.

"Good. Good. Now look alive and take yourselves a break it'll be show time soon." Tball said to his ragtag group of teenagers and young adults. Being a twenty-one-year-old himself Tball could empathize with their reluctance towards work but in the end work is work, and he believed whole-heartedly that to make ends meet you had to put in plenty of said work first.

"But we didn't even do anything since you-"

Jared was promptly silenced and drug away by his fellow coworkers, Tball being none the wiser. The employees of GameStop each found some down-time alone or amongst each other. The pleasant sound of white noise filling the retailer.

Three knocks then sounded against the store door. Tball stood from his seat to yell at the kids -again- for being so obnoxious in line and threaten -again- to send them to the back of said line, but was greeted with a familiar and expected face. Or well actually faces, friendly faces.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Sarah or Div

Entry 508: October 7th, 2032

11:14 am - Awoke

11:15 am - Checked Phone for messages (nope/not from who l wanted)

12 pm - Left the house (needed food)

12:30 pm - Got back home

1 pm - Bored so l messaged him

1:06 pm - l think he's still asleep

1:10 pm - Writing a poem now

1:58 pm - Didn't like the poem l wrote but l kept it

3:25 pm - Going to Jonny and Avery's house

Closing her journal Sarah McDiver straightened up her shoulder-length black hair and stepped outside of her apartment complex. Sarah has been living alone for the last two years. Taking up work since entering High School, Sarah was able to save up enough cash to move out comfortably and rent an apartment. That was almost two years ago, and now moving into the prime of her beauty at the age of twenty Sarah's enjoying the calm and peacefulness of living alone and doing whatever she wants.

The only drawback being that she's bored out of her mind!

 _Figures babe would be asleep NOW when l am off and doing nothing. On days like these when the hot/humid weather of Florida is being directly counter-acted with the natural coolness of October._

' _How can you not walk around and enjoy this bomb weather?' That'd definitely be something he'd say._ Sarah thought, fighting the urge to check her phone again, or message him. Best not to seem clingy. Or blow up his phone.

She was in the midst of a nice walk. Destination her friends' place. In her navy blue sweater (her lover's favorite color) and a black pair of jeans. Her choker and earrings the only accessories on her person. Only accessories besides the satin cap that always seems to be on her head if she could get away with it, the cap itself a startling white to act inversely to her skin pigment and accessories. Her powerful pair-shaped frame made nice time towards her friends' house, the average heighted girl walked for minutes to their apartment a few blocks down.

Later on today, her, the twins that she's going to go see now, and a few other friends, as well as her boyfriend, would all be meeting at the GameStop closer to where they live to get their hands onto the newest game on the market. All thanks to their mutual friend who works there.

"I wonder who else will be getting their hands on GDFO." Sarah said to herself. As she walked she thought about who would be getting the game, which led her to thinking about her friends, which led her to thinking about High School and how she met them.

In High School Sarah had meet the group of gamers that she plays games with now. Though an in-school club, which over time evolved into an after-school program they all enjoy. A program that even now Sarah attends, whenever she can as a graduate and busy body.

Sarah smiled and bit back a laugh at a funny thought. _Oh the club's going to be so salty when they find out that the The Crew all got the only AniSum virtual video game available on the day it came out._

From there her thoughts became especially vindictive when she thought about rubbing it in the face of a few of the snobbier gamers who attended. Sarah couldn't help but bark out a shout of laughter at the stupid looks she would be given when she says that she and all her friends played during the launch of the biggest game since SAO. _Oh yes, I may be wasting my life away with video games but goddamn it if I can't enjoy myself while doing it._

Entering the apartment complex, Sarah walked up the stairs of block 1b and knocked on the door to Room 509. Her own signature knock, five raps then pause.

"Oh, c'mon their home, they're always home." Sarah complained.

 _I swear on everything I love if l came all the way out here just for these two knuckleheads to be gone!_

And then the door opened to reveal an average looking male.

"Sarah? Huh we were going to call."

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Jonny or Cratoos | Avery or Jak

Jonny Cane looked over to the analog clock above the door as he approached it, 4pm sharp.

"Who is it Jonny!?" Avery said from the other room.

"I don't know, checking!" Jonny replied.

The Cane twins, Jonny and Avery, did everything together. From when they were just children to present. From birthday parties every year, to menial things like having the same haircut. Even though they are not identical to each other they might as well be, the only and easiest distinguishing physical trait between the two being the fact that Avery wears glasses while Jonny does not.

Besides that, their physical differences are much more vague. 6 feet even in height and (appearing) athletic respectively. With a Portuguese mother and Spanish father between them the boys came to be pale in complexion with spots of freckles.

Mentally, the boys have distinctly different tastes in multiple things, but when it comes to their love of video games, they simply have the same everything! Avery has even forgone creating a character for a video game and just started using the character Jonny made, and vice versa.

Swinging the door open confidently Jonny was not all that surprised to see Sarah, a good friend from grade school standing there in all of her annoyed five and a half feet of glory.

"Sarah? Huh we were going to call." Jonny questioned briefly, crossing his arms.

"You gonna let me in or not?" Sarah did not wait for an answer and pushed her way inside of the two-bedroom apartment anyways.

Jonny smiled at her annoyance, "You know Sarah instead of, l don't know, walking all the way here and hurting your delicate feet, you could of just called we would of picked you up on the way."

Jonny dipped out of sight into the kitchen to grab some drinks. "Mhm l know, but l was bored, so l decided to get in my daily bit of exercise." Sarah said her grin palpable in the air, and audibly plopping onto a couch cushion.

"Mhm." Jonny mimicked, walking back into sight carrying Chips & Salsa, as well as drinks. Seeing the handful of Cheetos wrappers held in her hand and the sassy look on her face, he felt his face burn.

"Saying' my feet are delicate feet, what's this, when was the last time you went for a walk, actually when's the last time you exercised period?!"

"Touché." Jonny conceded, placing the food on the coffee table, and then taking the chip bags to the trash.

"Where is Avery?" Sarah asked, not hearing Jonny's twin, they're never far from each other.

"I'm here, was just getting ready." Avery walked into view of Sarah, still combing his moderately long hair hair and adjusting his glasses. He and his brother were doing different styles in hair again. His barely touching his ears and his brother's cut very short.

"Getting ready for what. A twenty-minute trip to GameStop. You got some hoes to impress." They were not questions.

Avery flushed scarlet at the jab, and Jonny laughed at his expense. Happy to not be the one being made fun of. "Assholes." Avery muttered.

" Aw, don't be like that~." Sarah took a chip and dipped it deep in the salsa leaving the spicy smell in the air. "Chin up, how about a chip on me?" Sarah offered the chip up to the flustered male.

"They're my chips!" Avery said in exasperation but still leaned down and ate the chip from her hand though, and biting her fingers in the process. "Ow!" Sarah screeched.

Jonny failed at stifling his laughter. "Watch out bro she's taken."

Standing and swatting Avery in his head (who's response was to flail and die theatrically) Sarah scolded, "Yeah watch where you're aiming that thing Jaws." The triplet smiled at the banter before sitting in a rough triangle eating Chips and Salsa liberally.

"So, l heard Azura Rivera is the Director & Lead Programmer for GDFO." Sarah opened.

"Yeah, but that's common knowledge, have you seen the size of the game itself? Thing is supposed to be huge in actual memory space and that's not even factoring the future DLCs," He paused to eat a chip. "I mean boy it'll be one fat game in the memory drive of my AniSum." Avery rattled off, ready to drop more knowledge.

Sarah and Jonny shared a look.

The silent conversation having one apologize to the other, and the other accepting the apology without a second glance, it's too late now Avery has been started. Sarah even pointedly looked at her phone and texted her boyfriend to see if Avery would care, he didn't even seem to notice. "But I thought the actual size of the game wasn't confirmed yet?" Sarah said disinterested and texting her boyfriend.

"Well I'm obviously talking about the estimated size Sarah." Avery corrected.

He then proceeded to rattle on all the little facts and tidbits, as well as teasers he heard about and saw of the game that'll be launching in the next few hours. And right as Sarah's ears were about to fall off and her brain was going to overheat, Avery paused in his triade and said something that made them all freeze.

"What time did Tball say to get to GameStop?"

"Before five in the afternoon." Sarah and Jonny said in unison. All three of them checked the time, though a different outlet.

4:42 pm. Crap. GameStop is almost twenty-five minutes from here, on light traffic.

The trio was out of the door and marching towards the car at a pace that any bystander would find dizzying, "Didn't Tball say if we showed up any later than five it would be our ass-" Jonny started, jogging behind his brother and their friend.

"Less lip more zip boys we're runnin' late!"

The dark-skinned girl was leading the charge.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Nick or Smoke | Murphy or Wolfgang Van Houten | Josh or Ultorem

Three good friends were walking casually to the newest game on the market. Why they didn't drive was all based on a whim.

Fletcher Murphy is one of those friends. He was born in Annapolis, Maryland and during his youth, he and his family moved to Florida so that his father could return to where he'd grew up. Only having vague memories of living in Maryland, Murphy fancies himself a native Floridian. The only pastime worth noting from Maryland is Murphy's fondness of videogames, but not playing. He was far too young to understand a controller then, but he did have vivid memories of watching an elder cousin play them. So if he had to trace his love of videogames anywhere it would probably be to there.

At seventeen years old Murphy is a bit on the skinny side but not overly so, he is also average in height which makes him feel short around his good friends Nick Vantreska, and Josh Clair, who are each a bit over six feet tall themselves. Pale and simply average in build Murphy never really had many friends, an introverted boy turned man, but the friends he did make in the video gaming crew that he is a part of have always been more than enough for him.

Scratching his brown hair back and rubbing his light stubble, Murphy was content in listening to his other two friends bicker about, Murphy listened more intently. Nothing of importance apparently.

"Well, from what l understand after watching the trailer, and from all of the little teasers and different screenshots online, GDFO is supposed to have a lot of PvP and less PvE than people thought when news first came out about it a few years ago." Josh said walking along-side his best friend Nick Vantreska.

"And, what's your point? That we should all pick the Assassin class just because you think it's the best, or is it because you always pick assassin classes when you play any game that lets you?" Nick bit back, annoyed that his blond-haired bifocal using best friend is really trying to use flawed logic to get his way.

"I'm just trying to help you understand-"

"Yeah, yeah shut up." Nick says.

The two conversationalists had gone to all the same schools before graduating and decided to not go straight into college, and immediately got jobs nearly at the same time.

Nick has always had an independent streak, smoking before the age of eighteen, getting arrested at fifteen, graduating at seventeen, moving out of the house after graduation and moving in with his older brother, Nick has always been a troublemaker.

And that's what made him so popular, his charismatic attitude and devil-may-care disposition. The only people who could truly ever curb his recklessness would be his older brother and Josh. In school all of his not-so-close friends would call him 'Rocky', nobody knows why though.

Josh, on the other hand couldn't help but constantly be the party pooper, bringing about his nickname 'Latrine'. Though none of his actual friends call him that. Between Nick being unable to see consequences, and Murphy simply going along with the young man's hair-brained schemes, it seemed like the most intelligent and the eldest of the three had to be the voice of reason in almost every case. Thankfully they weren't doing anything crazy today.

"What time is it?" Murphy asked.

"Um. . . 4:12 we'll get there early, like really early." Josh replied.

"Why don't we stop for something to eat, l'm hungry?" Nick said, moving to detour the group. Josh caught Nick by the back of his shirt and pulled him back on course, "You practically cleaned out your fridge on the way out, no detours, no potty breaks, Tball said he rather we show up early than 'By the skin of our teeth' as he put it."

"Alright, but afterwards we stop for food." The trio nodded in agreement and continued in silence for the remainder of the walk. Or well part of it, Nick made sure it wasn't quiet for too long at a time. They arrived at GameStop at 4:21 pm to be greeted by the longest GameStop line they have ever seen in their lives. Catching their stupor at the line, they approached.

Each of the teenagers had a distinctive way of walking, Nick with swagger as he passed the people lined parallel to the store, Josh with a nonchalant confidence, and Murphy with a little bit of anxiousness and pity for the line-sitters. An odd trio to observe as far as the GameStoppers were concerned.

Once reaching the front of the line, and bypassing a few pre-teens making faces though the store's window, Josh stepped forward and knocked on the window. The man at the very front of the line opened his mouth to tell the teens off for skipping, but the entrance to the store promptly opened cutting him off.

Tball looked a little shocked to see the trio there. _Probably didn't expect us so early._ Josh figured.

"Sup guys, head into the back-room storage there are a few chairs back there." Tball said stepping aside and letting the three younger males step inside of the store.

"Cool." Nick breezed past.

"Thanks for helping us Tball." Murphy thanked as he walked inside.

"Yeah thanks man." Josh agreed.

"Don't worry about it, you guys still have to pay, but it's really not a problem for me to get you guys the game without the hassle of a line." Tball said.

"Do you know when the others are coming?" Tball asked Josh as they walked to the back.

"Nah don't know when. But they'll be here." Josh replied, silently happy to be back under air conditioning.

"Mkay, don't let Nick do some crazy shit in my store." Tball said turning back to go to the front of the store.

"No problem bud." Josh assured entering the back room and lounging with his friends.

Murphy heard the important bits of Tball and Josh's conversation and grew a mischievous smile as they got to the back and sat down.

"Hey, Nick see that thing," Murphy said.

"What thing?" Nick replied.

"Everything." Murphy said cheekily.

"What are you talk-"

"Yeah, don't touch it." Josh finished, giving Nick a gimlet eye.

"Wasn't going to. . ." Nick muttered.

And they all shared a good-natured laugh.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Daniel or Charles 'Bendazi' Rancliff

Daniel Swain left his parent's home and got into his car. Running through his pre-driving ritual in it, he buckled his seatbelt and got ready to pull out of his parent's driveway. Daniel adjusted his glasses and smiled at himself in the mirror. Caucasian skin, and curly brown hair, Daniel felt as if he'd already turned his day into a very productive one. Now it was time to go get the icing on the cake.

 _Ok, I'm lookin' good._ Daniel thought to himself. Pulling out of the driveway, he started driving towards a GameStop far southward, checking the time in the process. 4:10.

 _l should head Brian's way he's probably already walking._

Daniel and Brian have been really good friends ever since Brian was invited to The Crew by a mutual friend, Murphy. The duo played plenty of sports together in High School and over time grew to branch out into other area of entertainment, one of such being videogames. Whatever platform it may be they made sure to get it together, and when GDFO was confirmed the pair set out to buy it's platform AniSum as soon as possible. Before it raised up in price.

 _He probably just started walking to GameStop without telling anyone a word, either that or he's still sleeping knowing him._

Within ten minutes, Daniel made it to Brian's house. He was not home, which means he's already there or walking there now. Pulling out of Brian's driveway Daniel drove in the direction of GameStop and lo and behold, there the guy was, walking with his hair barely combed in a presentable fashion, and not an accessory on him.

"Brian!" Daniel called.

The tall guy swiveled his head backwards to see who was calling him. Slowing down, Daniel drove beside him. "Get in bro."

"Yeah man," Brian got inside of the black Toyota Camry. "Thanks for the lift." Brian smiled at his best friend, before frowning in thought, "You stop by King's on the way here?"

"Nah l actually just started diving this way as soon as l got in the car." _You want to pick up King too huh._

"Hm, we should go pick up King, or at least see if he left the house, because it is only 4:25 and we have time. I mean he is on the way bro." Brian reasoned.

"How did l know you were going to say that?" Daniel laughed, and Brian joined him.

"Cause you already know!" Brian grinned at being caught. "C'mon man, it's really not that far out of the way." Brian smiled a winner's smile trying to coax Daniel to his way of thinking.

"Ok," Brian smiled at the answer he wanted.

"You're paying for gas though." Brian's smile turned into a grimace, and Daniel laughed all the way to the gas station.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

King or Kingster

Patrick King was just getting ready to walk out of the house when two of his friends pulled up in front of his grandmother's home. King's been living with his Nana for close to a dozen years. After his parents died in a car accident in Ohio, King had moved south to live with his grandmother Alicia.

Red-headed with a bit of baby fat still on his face and his freckles, King had never had a problem with attracting the opposite sex, in fact, King to the layman would appear to be a bit of a player. Though after a particularly ugly break up with a girl in-which King was in love with, he fell into a bit of a depression.

Seeing this, Nana recommended to King a sort of carefree de-stressor that her son, King's late father seemed to love when he was alive. Videogames.

From there, King played them, Console, PC, and his favorite, Virtual Reality. It wasn't the most fun to him, and there were a few games he conceded he would never understand but it made him feel closer to his long past father, it also was nice to see Nana smile whenever he played. When she thought he wouldn't notice.

Using some of the educational programs (which were the only things available to VR platformers before) for schooling, King was extremely disappointed to find that this amazing platform had no games associated with it. But not anymore, Great Door Fantasy Online is coming out today, and while King was planning on biking it there, his ride seems to have delivered itself to his lap.

Walking down the steps King was slightly surprised to find Brian, a fellow Crew member and friend of his frowning in the passenger seat. "Heya guys, didn't expect to see you here at my house. Hehe." King smiled awkwardly. You'd think that with his striking good looks, King would be less socially awkward, regardless the ladies usually came to him, so he never had to say much.

"Sup Kingsterboy!" Daniel greeted cheekily around Brian, using one of King's online usernames as his greeting. Brian stayed defiantly silent.

"Brian?" King asked curiously.

"Don't worry about him, get in, we decided to pick you up, got anywhere you need to go? I just filled up on gas." Daniel asked with a devious inflection in his voice, leaning back into his seat.

Brian looked over to the grinning Daniel with a deadly serious look on his face. "I'll kill you."

"Oo-Kay" King said. Daniel's grin doesn't drop for a second.

Saying bye to Nana, King opened the door to the back seat, got inside, and they were off. They made good time by taking the roads with much less traffic, and arrived just about fifteen minutes before GameStops throughout the country would release the game of the decade.

They barely found a spot in the open plaza of interest, and pulling into an empty lot, they got out of Daniel's car. To gape dumbly and bug out their eyes at the ludicrously long line in front of their destination (one much longer than the one Nick, Josh, and Murphy got to see).

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

4:50. Four-Fifty. Four. Fifty. Jonny had to drive like a gat out of hell to get there with so much time spare. And the ride was deathly silent as well, not a person on this side of the planet can say that these young adults don't care about their video games. To the trio it was almost physically painful to watch the time on the car's clock tick by.

In the end what broke the awkward silence was Jonny pointing out the funniest thing any of the three had seen all day. "Ten bucks says they catch flies." Jonny joked pulling into the plaza and looking directly at the one black kid, and two white kids gaping openly, car doors open at the line across the street.

Avery looked over and laughed, "Hah they're burgers!" He said using his favorite insult.

 _This is what he was doing all this time! I messaged you FORTY times!_ From the look on her face Sarah was pleased.

Jonny pulled into a space next to his younger friends and turned off the car. Brian, startled at the sound so close to his person, closed his mouth and turned to see his girlfriend as well as two other good friends.

"Hey lover! Took you guys long enough, thought you-" Brian's smile died at the look of death on Sarah's face. In a preemptive knee-jerk reaction, akin to birds flying away before a natural disaster or old Grandpa getting joint pains before a bad storm, Brian promptly turning 180°.

And ran away. Directly towards his salvation in the GameStop across the street.

"WHERE THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOUR GOING!?" Sarah screeched marching after him. Brian didn't know what he did, but didn't really care it was more about survival at this point than anything else.

"Hey Daniel, King." Jonny said rolling his eyes.

"Sup. . . Bros." King replied amazed at how fast Brian was running.

"Burgers. What's up fellas." Avery greeted.

"Bro look at him run," Daniel burst out laughing at the sight, "Yo what did he do?!" He was almost crying.

They looked to each other and between them couldn't come up with a decent enough guess, so gave up. And as a group of four guys, they walked directly to the GameStop across the street.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

Tball heard an erratic knocking on the glass door and it made him a bit pissed. Okay more than a bit. It's almost 4:52 and most of his friends still haven't showed up, he couldn't keep the people outside waiting any more than 5, they had to open then and from there the store, including himself would be too busy to give favoritism to his friends.

Stepping up to the poster-covered metal and glass door Tball opened it and was greeted with a frantic looking Brian.

"Hey Tball," Brian said, turning back to see a fuming Sarah stomping her way toward him. Swinging his head back around to his older friend the growing panic in his eyes became more apparent with the passing seconds.

"Tball I don't know what I did, but let me in. She's mad for no reason!" Brian exclaimed, to the amusement of anyone who cared to watch.

"You can't run forever. You know that right?" Tball said contemplating not letting him in just to spite 'em. Blocking the way.

"C'mon please let me live." Brian said in sad finality. Tball rolled his eyes (though no one could see it behind the shades), then stepped to the side. Allowing Brian to dart inside, he quickly found his hiding place of choice.

"Hey Tball." Sarah said sweetly as she breezes by entering and instantly finding Brian. Or at least that's what Tball figured from the 'manly' screams of pains he could hear. Tball nodded in acknowledgement and smiled at her playful wink. So, he hadn't made the lady too angry, she's just annoyed and was looking to relieve her frustration. At her lover's expense of course. Or maybe she wanted to see blood those screams sounded serious.

"Here dude I got you!" Tball heard one of his employees say behind him and from there Jared's screams accompanied Brian's.

After Sarah entered Tball looked outward and saw a few more men walking directly toward the store. _And here comes these fucking guys, walking like it's a Sunday stroll._ Tball thought to himself.

"Straight to the back and take the 'happy' couple with you." Tball said to the group of guys walking up and joking conversationally about how many new holes Sarah is going to tear her boyfriend.

"Ok boss." Jonny was the only one to respond verbally as they piled into the building, single-file. Still enjoying themselves at Brian's expense.

"Yo! What the heck man? You let like ten people in five min-"

Tball cut off the complaining line-sitters with the only thing that could, "Are you ready for the drop of the biggest game of the decade?!" His random question was met with a rictus, and very mixed, cry from the crowd.

Pleased with the affirmative response, Tball looked down at his watch to see just how soon he would have before being forced to make good on his promise in delivering said game.

4:55 pm.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

After having his ears blown up and pulled by his girlfriend for being 'An inconsiderate boyfriend of the highest order', Brian was glad to be dragged off by Daniel into the -now slightly cramped- backroom, and was even more glad when Tball rushed in about thirty seconds later, cutting off Sarah from having any more fun biting his head off.

 _My poor virgin ears._ Brian thought, nursing his ears conspicuously. "Ok babe, next time I'll be sure not to accidently leave my phone at the house," Sarah was not impressed. "Or forget to check it altogether when I woke up. Or sleep in so late."

"Shut it." Sarah responded.

Brian was the only one to laugh at his misfortune, Sarah was looking less impressed upon by the second, and everyone else was too focused on the small black briefcase to notice.

"You guys took forever," The six late-comers looked pointedly away. "So, let's be quick, we have. . . Four minutes to get this over with so here. " Tball promptly gave each person there a black chip, and closed the briefcase with a single chip inside for himself.

"Why did l expect more?" Nick looked even less impressed than Sarah at this point. Inspecting the small chip and waiting, as if willing it to do something amazing.

"It is supposed to be the newest, sleekest, and badass game on the market, what l want to know is why we had to wait so long for you to give us this-" Josh was cut off mid-sentence, by Tball.

"I wanted the moment of us all getting the thing to- l don't know. . . whatever. Everyone out! Store's gotta open in like now, l blame you for being late." Tball rattled, visibly twitching at every tick on the analog clock on the wall, and pointing his hate-filled finger at Brian.

"What?" Brian squawked. A few in the group looked to each other trying to figure out Tball's reasoning for blaming him out of everyone.

"All of you out. Now." Tball swung the same finger to the exit. Grumbling about having to get up The Crew filled out like sheep, shuffling and complaining all the way.

"Don't see why you blame me Tball, but guys remember, get on at eight sharp. Because that's when the game launches, and l'm really not looking to wait up on you guys." Brian practically demanded.

There were grunts of assent, and one blatant 'no', but that was all in good stead. Nobody in The Crew will be missing the launch on their lives.

Tball escorted the entourage out and as he let his friends out, he let the line-sitters bustle in, leaving his employees further inside to deal with the actual task of keeping order.

"We'll catch you in-game Tball, alright man?" Jonny said at the rear of the group.

"Yeah." Tball replied coolly, giving away little behind his glasses.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

The Crew did not stay together. Usually they would, but today is special, and no one wants to stray far from their homes. No one wants to stray away from their AniSum.

AniSum was created by Data Summer Inc., the corporation that bought both the Cardinal System as well as NerveGear that Argus was forced to sell after going bankrupt. The North American company had soon afterward gone silent. The atrocities happening in SAO over the course of the two years in which the players were trapped assured to the company that telling the world about their development of the Animation Summoner could wait until nearer to launch-time of the eventual game it would host. Of course, hiding such hot information failed, but hype for the platform and then game -that did not even have a name yet- was speculated about by generations abroad. The old and young, of many ethnicities and nationalities across the world. And the only thing that all of the people arguing on social media could agree on is that 'We are more than ready for the release of a publicly successful VR videogame, be it a MMO or not like the last!'

Data Summer lnc. used the NerveGear as a base for the AniSum, which is why the AniSum looks so helmet-esque. With a sleeker design and a vibrant customization aesthetic, the AniSum was accepted and successfully launched into the market a few years prior to the launch of Great Door Fantasy. This brought back VR schooling. Which persisted as the only avenue of VR until now.

Instead of riding with Daniel again, Brian rode with Sarah, Jonny, and Avery. He actually left his AniSum at Sarah's, knowing that today would be launch day, looking to take advantage of the quiet nature of Sarah's home instead of his rowdy louder home. Pitfalls of still living with your parents.

Daniel was given the unfortunate task of driving King, Murphy, Josh, and Nick to their homes. With the conversation going something like, "You guys should ride with Daniel. He just filled up on gas, save yourselves the walking time." Brian offered.

Everyone seemed to be in agreement, or well everyone except for Daniel, who could not find a decent reason to not give his friends a lift. _I'm going to be driving back and forth all across town getting these guys home!_ Daniel thought to himself.

And from the look on Brian's face as Jonny backed out of the lot, he knew as much when he suggested it. _You sneaky bastard!_ Daniel couldn't help but grin at the fact that, in the end, he was played.

The ride towards the twins' and Sarah's part of town was uneventful. Small talk and lazy conversation kept the ride from becoming overly quiet. With the game in-hand everyone was content to allow brief lapses of silence to permeate the air. Pulling into the apartment complex in which Sarah lives, the twins said their farewells and the young couple replied in-kind.

"Hungry?" Sarah asked, looking to Brian.

"Depends on if you have any meat or seafood in the house." Brian joked to Sarah before taking her hand, they walked and talked to her apartment building. Sarah was a bacon-lover turned vegetarian, and after an especially horrible experience with seafood, she went cold turkey with that too. . . or well, cold fish.

"You're funny." Sarah started airily, before her tone became reprimanding. "You know l can't even stand being around seafood anymore!"

"Mhm." Brian smiled and kissed her deadpanned face. Ignoring his jab Sarah changed the subject.

"Babe, seriously, what do you want for dinner?" Sarah asked genuinely, taking out her keys and unlocking her two bedroom, one bathroom apartment.

"Why don't we order out, l'll pay. I found this one pizza place that delivers bomb pizza." Brian suggested as he checked the time on Sarah's phone, 6:43pm.

"They deliver bomb pizza?" Sarah joked from in the bathroom out of sight, making fun of her boyfriend's style of Ebonics and phrases.

"Mhm, the bombest. It's bombastic I'd bet on that." He replied, calling for the pizza delivery.

The plan was to have the pizza delivered to the house before they dived into the Ani, but apparently someone is having a birthday party at the pizza place as he called. Weird and annoying seeing as how the pizza place is takeout only. How they managed to get a _birthday party_ of all things started in there was a real brain teaser.

The couple was able to order pizza anyway at the pizza restaurant, they'd just have to logout and collect it while they were playing because that was around when the party would end. Sarah suggested getting something else, or pizza from a different place but Brian was adamant that it would be much better for them to wait it out. So planning on logging out and eating their dinner before slipping back into the world of GDFO, they forwent eating right then.

Lounging and being cute over the next couple of hours, as well as a healthy sprinkle of annoying the life out of each other, Brian and Sarah were finally lying in bed together comfortably and patiently at 7:59 pm waiting for that last minute of eternity to pass.

. . . And it sure was taking it's ti-

8 pm. Finally.

With the awkward helmets on their head Brian looked over to his lover and said, "Ladies first."

Sarah smiled and activated the voice command to turn on both of their Ani's and bypass the directory menu, going straight into the game simultaneously. "Command four. Link," Dramatic pause. "Start!"

A starburst of light flashed, and the two lovers went lax in each other's arms.

_Great Door Fantasy Online_

 **Big thanks to my betas AwesomeA909, Kipopo, and Ancient Glory! These three did an amazing job cleaning up my mistakes wherever l made them.**

 **Updated Note: Save you guys the trouble. In order of appearance.**

 **Brian Steele - Thrumaticus 'Thrum' Thomil**

 **Timothy Ballins - Tball Skulls**

 **Sarah McDiver - Div**

 **Jonny Cane - Cratoos**

 **Avery Cane - Jak**

 **Fletcher Murphy - Wolfgang Van Houten**

 **Josh Clair - Ultorem**

 **Nick Vantreska - Smoke**

 **Daniel Swain - Charles 'Bendazi' Rancliff**

 **Patrick King - Kingster**

 **I know a lot of new faces here, but it's my job to make them come alive, and if you stick around with this story you'll watch these characters come to life. If you got this far, give this FanFic a chance. Oh and please review, l write for those. This is Jason signing out. Just Jason.**

 **Uploaded September 6th, 2016**

 **Updated January 8th, 2018**


	2. Thrum

**Hey, hey guys I'm back with another chapter of The Salient. Hopefully this chapter will have less mush and bore, and be more action and fantasy. If you made it this far l really shouldn't have to say that this story is driven by OCs, so this'll be your last reminder/warning. For those who reviewed the last chapter, thank you. That being said don't forget to REVIEW the chapter. And enjoy reading it in the meantime.**

 **Chapter 2: Thrum**

Dark. Its pitch black here.

 _Where am l?_ Brian thought to himself in the dark nothingness of void.

Ping! The sound and bright pop-up screen blinded Brian momentarily. Letting his eyes adjust, he looked over the floating holo projection.

 **The VRMMORPG Great Door Fantasy Online requires vital information for the enabling of your gaming experience, Player. Please fill out the chart as shown diligently. You will be spawned into a predetermined location by the Cardinal System after you have submitted your player information.**

Brian read and re-read the message before continuing to the Character Creation Projection. _Hm. Ok lets see. . . l think. . . this'll work. At least l don't have to worry about us ending up on different servers, there is only one available to the public right now by the looks of it. I think._ Brian thought to himself as he fills out the customization form.

 **Name:** Thrumaticus Thomil

 **Age:** Eighteen

 **Height:** 6 feet 2 inches (1.88 meters)

 **Race:** African American

 **Weight:** 170 pounds (77.1 kg)

 **Pick two of the seven classes, the first as your primary and the second as your secondary. Your character will also inherently obtain one 'weak' class in-which your character will be deficient. This class will be your characters 'Achilles Heel'. These classes, depending on your selection, will unlock a specialized group of Class Tree. These trees are based off of your initial selection NOW. Please select two options from the selection below:**

 **Warrior, Tank, Mage, Assassin, Archer, Beast Tamer, or Trapper/Staller.**

 **Primary:** Warrior

 **Secondary:** Trapper/Staller

The basic class selection seemed obvious, the only class that Brian actively read over is the Trapper/Staller class. A class that specializes in use of low-cost skills and a large pool of hit points, seemed a-okay to him. The only drawback is the lack of finishing power to the class. A primary in Warrior will help. Or at least that's what he's is hoping for.

Content with the choices he made, Brian pressed the large blocky 'SUBMIT' button.

The pop-up, vanished, and with it the dark void surrounding Brian's person.

Immediately he felt different, enhanced. Brian felt better than he ever had in his life; his muscles felt denser, his body felt tense, and he felt poised like a spring. He felt less awkward in his body, more comfortable, less anxious and calmer. The best way he could explain it is like getting back under a comforter on a cold morning.

He felt less like Brian. . He felt like . . _I am like. . No I am. Thrum. This_ _feels amazing._ Thrum thought to himself. Glancing around at his surroundings, Thrum surveyed the deep green of the foliage around him. Thick vines hung from the canopy above nearly touching the ground with their length. The dense thigh-high grass staining Thrum's leather trousers green. _l must be in some type of jungle section of the world. He_ summarized.

Thrum inhaled deeply, enjoying the peculiar _feel_ of the air inflating his lungs, and then exhaled slowly. And the _sounds!_ Between the sounds of familiar animals, and even unfamiliar sounds it was a symphony here. But even in this setting unseen before to Brian, Thrum was utterly confident. Nothing can hurt him now, and believing in that wholeheartedly, the tall male basked in this moment.

 _Ah the world, here, it feels so vibrant and alive._ Thrum stretched his arms over his head. Settling on his heels he looked around, to catch the eyes of something nearby.

Staring at the interesting creature, the Spotting System, identified the Monster to be a Jungle Impache, and Thrum laughed.

 _The poor thing's only level one!_ Thrum seemed to lose the irony in the fact that he himself is only level one! The feral beast's a bit less than three feet tall, with lanky arms, a thin build and poofy fur. The only places with a lack of that thick silver fur would be the animal's hands and feet.

"Ahahaha! Whats the matter, mad cause l popped in while you were taking a- " Thrum would of used an obscenity to insult the monster but was cut off by the beast's shrill scream. Which wouldn't of have been so bad if it was not accompanied by both a system pop-up of some kind, and the much more pressing of the distractions, the Monster rushing Thrum from thirty feet away deceptively fast.

Thrum would of been bowled over if this was the real world, good thing it isn't. Hopping out of the way of the imp-sized creature's path Thrum instinctively reached for the sword at his hip, which did not exist. _Shit._ _This fight just got a lot more serious, and a lot less possible._ Turning away from the fleet-footed Monster, Thrum sprinted away as fast as his feet could manage.

Moving scarily fast -especially to himself- Thrum weaved around trees, hopped rotting logs, performed a near 90° change in motion while keeping all of his momentum, and jumped a large river at full speed, hanging in the air for a full five seconds before landing in a smooth roll on the opposing bank.

Thrum panted in euphoria. The wind howling in his ears, the hot beat of the sun on his back when the canopy breaks, and even hotter prickle of breath on the back of his neck. Thrum shivered with glee, and would of have run for as long as his feet could carry him.

The sensory overload that comes with dropping into this world, the colors all seeming a shade unnaturally _bright,_ the sounds so much more _crisp,_ an ocean of sensation sweeping through and making all concerns seem _distant_. Far away. Players all throughout the world are having the same problem. This world is to the real world as a mosaic is to a carpet stain. And then _something_ brought his mind back to focus.

An irrational, and niggling, twitch in the mind, telling him there is something around here. Danger! Thrum had nearly lost his inhibitions to this world and probably would of died because of it. Thrum stopped laughing maniacally and broke his sprint, sliding up against a tree in front of him. Buckling down, he took in his surroundings.

 _Where are they, l swear they were right on my tail. How did they go from right behind me to just disappearing?!_ Thrum thought to himself. They, because Thrum's pursuer had made some kind of chirping noise as they ran, alerting others of his kind that there's an intruder to their domain.

After a few breaths to calm down he went still and held his breath, and it was as he tilted slightly to get up he could hear them, and as he focused, see them as well. The sounds of feet thumping against branches, that's one. Another just outside of his vision, behind one of the trees to his left, the sneaky bastard would dart around just out of his vision whenever Thrum would try to get a good look of the Imp. Though interestingly enough, this second one looks the same, but maybe a darker shade of silver? And then the original lmp dropped down a dozen yards away from him.

Now that Thrum had been still for a few seconds, the pop-up from before opened up just below Thrum's field of vision. If the annoying fuzzball hadn't attacked yet, it probably was waiting for something. Letting his eyes wander to the insistent message,Thrum found out some useful information, and some not so useful information.

First of which, how to open the Player Menu: a flick of the wrist and a _boom_ you got menu. Second of which happens to be that a bit of starting equipment lies in his Inventory, including his sword. Lastly in the message there was something about a public announcement, but Thrum didn't have enough time to read that message over before hastily discarding the pop-up entirely. The Jungle Impache have re-grouped.

Dropping down from the trees an Imp landed next to the original and grinned lasciviously, then a second came darting out from behind a tree and stopped to stand on the other side of Fuzzball. _They are different! Those two beside Fuzzball are smaller and slightly less imposing. ls he some type of alpha beast, their levels are all the same? He must be because he's the only one with silver fur, the others must be the normal tier Jungle Impache, well then. Its just as well to be my luck to find a rare enemy on the first try, without even trying!_ Thrum studied the Impache as they slowly made a semicircle around him, and flicked his wrist casually and paused. When it opened Thrum spared a half-second to locate his Inventory. and clicked it. Equipping his Iron Short Sword - _thank goodness a weapon was there_ \- Thrum felt the leather handle materialize in his hand and grinned a lascivious grin similar to the beast's _._ The lmpache tensed at the sight of the weapon, but Fuzzball who hadn't moved since showing up looked about as unimpressed as a beast of his caliber and level could, which is more than you'd think.

And then, passing some sort of message between each other, the grey balls of lightning darted towards Thrum in a pincer attack. Anticipating them to make the first move, Thrum tensed his legs and waited. The beasts are the same level and class, they rushed him at the same time, and aren't intelligent enough to come up with an actual strategy of attack. Meaning, Thrum only had to watch one to know when the other to his side would show up.

Waiting for the Jungle Impache to get as close as Thrum could allow, he jumped backwards. This put him further away from the alpha, and left the two others to collide with each other. But the Impache are dexterous if nothing else, and dodge each other just barely.

Then Thrum went on the offense, rushing one of the downed Imps. "EYAAAAAH!" The lmp howled its pain to the heavens.

The strike was not fatal, but now that Imp's health bar has about a quarter left. _Their fast but not tanky at all._ Thrum thought to himself. The horizontal slash severed the Imp's arm, leaving a bleeding stump. The arm that Thrum severed disappeared into nothingness.

Like greased lightning, the second lmp slammed into Thrum from behind. This saved the first lmp from a grisly death. The second lmp buried it's fangs into the tough leather of Thrum's shirt. Thrum hissed in pain, and in his peripheral could see the other beast dart forward to capitalize on his weakness. Thrum threw himself out of the path of the rushing Imp and landed roughly on his back. Right where the lmp was latched on. Knocking the wind out of the lmp. Thrum studied the yellow lightning symbol by the, now injured, lmpache's health bar.

It's obvious what that symbol means, at least to a veteran videogame player like Brian. The _bastard_ is stunned! Raising his iron sword in a reverse grip Thrum plunged the blade into the monster's lung savagely. The beast exploded instantly into a bunch of red flakes that floated around before fading into nothingness. The satisfying ping of death the game generates is particularly pleasant.

Rising like a ghost and nearly as silently as one,Thrum waited for the other two lmps to attack first. _Besides the alpha, these guys are impulsive! Thats how you beat them; even in numbers they're simplistic in their attacking patterns!_ Thrum grinned, understanding your enemy is essential in defeating them. Even Fuzzball has started to pace in anticipation!

Enraged at his prey's elusiveness, the grey furred lmpache rushed once more. To him, the fact that the other lmp died just means he gets more food at the end of it all. The lmp tries to confuse Thrum with a zig-zag approach, but without slowing down and by still attacking linearly, the poor thing was just asking to be cut in half. And so when it jumped for Thrum's face, teeth bared and red eyes gleaming hungrily, that's what he did. Cut him in half.

Not turning back to see if the deed was done, Thrum readied his blade between himself and Fuzzball.

The Alpha Class, Level One Jungle Impache, unofficially named Fuzzball ate up yards at a dizzying pace. Claws flashing with a red glow, the Alpha did not jump and leave himself prone, but slid instead and slashed for Thrum's ankles. The pro-gamer leaped the dangerous swipe. _His claws left a red trail. Melee skills, so there aren't just weapon ones huh._ Thrum turned, swinging his three foot long blade, and barely missed the beast with his _much_ larger range.

Pressing the advantage, Thrum slashed and hacked savagely, the beast was being pushed into a backpedal. Parrying with its claws whenever a cut nearly hit home and using its Unarmed Weapon skills, they danced dangerously. As Thrum continued to fight he began to learn quickly the do's and dont's of sword combat. Maybe it's the Warrior Class but Thrum could see the mounting progress, and behind it that itchy feeling in his hand now.

Horizontal, diagonal, backhand, step backward, step forward, and then another step forward. Before long the battle devolved from being a stand-up clash of weapons, to something more like kill-tag. Thrum slid behind trees, picked up rocks to throw, and even wrestled with the beast when it flat-out tackled him.

"Fuck you," Thrum panted between warding swipes, taking his turn to retreat. Checking his health, Thrum silently winced. Less than half now. "Stupid Fuzface, jus' die already!" The niggling pressure had coalesced into a ball in Thrum's hand, and it was waiting patiently for itself to be applied he could tell, but Thrum couldn't for the life of him figure out how!

Losing ground, Thrum couldn't even check the beast's health, because whenever he tried he would lose a bit of his own for lack of concentration. Thrum needed an edge, and this potential energy in his left wrist didn't seem to want to give him any breaks.

 _The fucker's so fast!_ Thrum withered back, fear creeping into his stance. One-third. Thrum's health had just turned from viridian green, to sickly yellow. Shoulder checking the lmp on one of its rare slips in footing, Thrum checked its health in the time allotted, just above half. _How in the hell did l beat the others if they're. . So much faster._ Face-palming at the fact that he had discarded his full-proof strategy for sword play, Thrum turned on his heel and sprinted away from the lmp at full speed.

The lmpache, expecting another round of wrestling, was positively pissed that his nearly defeated prey had started running away. The lmpache Alpha was up and chasing in a flash. Thrum could feel a lot of that potential energy in his wrist flee, kind of like he is now. But instead it returned to his skull, slightly warning to danger.

Thrum jumped to his side, straight into a tree, and back flipped off of it to lose his momentum all at once. The lmpache, not having a convenient tree, simply barreled into a bush unceremoniously. Right where Thrum had been running.

Thrum whistled, as if for a stray dog, and the roar of anger was slightly concerning. Thrum readied himself and was not disappointed. The shiny silver beast jetted out of the dense foliage and began glowing. The striking glow increased, and for the first time, Thrum noticed that the skills the lmpache would use were labeled by his health bar, _Rage Blitz_. Thrum wanted to, but couldn't dodge in time.

The enraged monster stuck hard, and would of have instantly killed Thrum if he had not braced himself for impact. Pushing Thrum back they flew nearly a dozen yards and through a wall of plant life. Still airborne, Thrum was blinded by the sun. Blinking fiercely and twisting to face the ground, Thrum realized that there _is no ground_ to face!

 _We were fighting on the edge of a cliff and didn't know it!_ Thrum thought to himself. And from here, Thrum could see for miles around. The forest here stretches on seeming endlessly. As far as the eye could see. Green, vibrant tree tops capped with fruit. Some with nests, nests containing eggs of a variety of colors. And a swath of blue on Thrum's left cuts through the green cleanly. An immense river, much larger than the one Thrum jumped lies there. Following the path of the river, Thrum caught the sight of a structure, just right to blind himself. The indigo building stuck out like a sore thumb, and looks worn as well.

"Reaghh!"

Thrum spun his body around, eyes gluing onto the now bright silver creature diving for him. To it this fight is not over. Thrum glanced at his health and saw that he is below ten. Not good. Opening his menu mid-free fall, Thrum grabbed one of the two potions from his Inventory and read the description to find out how to use it. A slow regeneration of ten percent of health, and drink to use. Downing both of the potions, Thrum watched the lmp slowly descend to him, faster than he himself is falling.

 _The ground is getting closer and so is he, l have to stop myself and lose this bitch on the way._ Thrum used his time sparingly. _The cliff side's sloping this way so. ._

With no apparent alternative, Thrum jammed his iron sword into the rocky surface.

Chink. The sword tip snapped but Thrum lost a chunk of momentum, the lmpache by then had already closed half of their distance. A series of jerky attempts to slow down seemed fruitless, and so instead, Thrum focused on the snarling threat above.

The combatants had reached the halfway point of their fall.

Using the sword as a ward, Thrum tried to keep the beast away. The lmpache used the outstretched blade as leverage, and taking the sharp edge in it's hand and pulling himself close. Ditching the sword so he can have his hand free Thrum and Fuzzball wrestled in mid air. Spiraling in a corkscrew fashion, they slammed each other into the cliff side. Shaving health off of each other in the most punishing and efficient way possible.

This went on for a good twenty seconds, a twenty second hell. With his weight advantage, Thrum was winning this particular game, and after a devastating crash against the cliff side the lmpache found itself stunned. Seeing his golden chance Thrum put the lmp under his own body and tensed hard before pushing off. This motion took Thrum only a second, but this minor stun only lasted half of that time. And so grabbing a hold of a branch jutting out of the passing rocks, Thrum found himself victim to a passenger.

"Hey Fuzzy?" Thrum asked, as the Jungle Impache tried to get a good grip on his foot. He was answered with a growl, promising death. "You like shoes? That's cool you can have one of mine." And so before the lmp could climb its way up with meager strength, Thrum kicked off his left low-top sneaker, watching in glee as the deranged monster yelped in fear, and plummeted hundreds of feet to its grisly demise. Still clutching Thrum's shoe in both hands, there was no chime of death this time. The monster died much too far away, but his death was confirmed. A much more happy sounding ding reverberated, and Thrum would of have been inclined to read the pop-up, if he was not suspending himself from death by a suspect-looking tree branch.

Looking up with his peripheral vision, Thrum checked his meager health. Apparently, the system know when a player is in combat, because every couple of seconds his percentage of health would raise by a point. It was not doing that during combat.

 _Annoying._ Thrum glared at his health, willing it to increase faster, Sadly, every ten seconds he would get another one percent. Trying to get a good handhold on the cliff, Thrum decided that while he still had some adrenaline he would get down from up here. So with one shoe and almost no health he began the decent.

_GDFO _

Thrum did not know how long it took for him to get to the forest floor, and gratefully took the time to repress everything that had transpired after submitting his Character Creation Projection. Opening the pop-up from before, Thrum was pleasantly surprised to find that he had leveled up. Checking his stats, Thrum decided to let the game suggest what to increase and went with the suggested permanent buffs. _Hopefully later i'll know what l need stat-wise, l don't want to use the system for stat improvement, there's usually a more optimum way to divvy stats besides the game's recommended style. At the same time,_ _l don't want to be the first to die in The Crew either so lemme just level real quick._ Thrum thought to himself.

Besides a level, Thrum found that Fuzzball left him something. Boots! _Fur-lined Jungle Boots._ With a stat buff of +5 speed. The boots were dark green with a black trim, with the laces matching the trim. All in all not bad for a level one drop, and even still he couldn't find the sneaker he dropped so they'd have to do either way. Equipping the boots, Thrum decided to head towards that indigo temple he saw while falling earlier.

Without a weapon he knew he wouldn't be able to fight well, hell, with a weapon Thrum knew he couldn't fight all that well. So it was with that thought, while walking in a Monster filled Jungle he made a mental note to get good. As soon as possible. _If push comes to shove i'll just run. Or I could die and see what happens. It's just one death and that way I can find out about death penalties and respawns- No actually! I'm sure the other guys would brag if i had a death and they hadn't had one yet. Especially Josh. So i guess i'm running, wait I never saw a map in the. . Hm maybe at this building up ahead i'll get some insight._ Thrum concluded, not stressing too much.

And so that's how he got by, running away from the near constant amount of Jungle lmpache. Not a one of them had the shiny silver fur of Fuzzball, which spoke of just how flipping rare they are. Thrum had even wrestled a few unsuspecting lmpache to death. But all they gave to him was experience and frail bronze coins. Probably the game's currency.

"These lmpache a so weak compared to how strong Fuzzball was, but there are so many of them. And these coins, i'm assuming there's a tier system to these and i'm only getting the crappy bad ones." Thrum said aloud, inspecting the bronze coins in the meantime. "The temple cant be much further from here either." Thrum peered into the darkness that is the canopy and could gleam nothing beyond a few yards. Unsurprising really. Glancing back down to the coin in his dirtied hand, Thrum inspected both sides. One depicting some sort of door or book, probably a door based on the name of the game. While the other side had a man on it, smiling and giving a Victory V with his index and middle fingers. _Weird I bet he's actually in here too or maybe had been and he's dead now?_

Letting the coin vanish into his inventory, Thrum started walking again.

 _l wonder how things are going with everyone else. l wonder if babe is having a hard time understanding the mechanics of the game. l still don't know how to use weapon skills and i'm already level three._ Thrum thought to himself idly. By now the forest sounds have become white noise to Thrum. Ambiance to fit the setting.

And just as Thrum was deciding to sit down for a moment and relax to get rid of his exhaustion de-buffs, the sea of trees parted to reveal the jungle temple he had seen earlier. The sun in the sky had drooped severely, leaving the once spooky forest a sinister sight. The sight was even more sinister thanks to the shadows. Shadows that only existed because of the glowing temple in front of Thrum.

The glowing temple looked so out of place, like a spaceship dropped from the sky here. The grass around the temple had the same vibrant color to it, but isn't wild in the slightest. No vines hugged the building, which to Thrum is extremely intriguing. "Okay freaky purple temple, wadaya want from me?" Thrum said aloud not expecting an answer, and not getting one. "Maybe someone's inside? . ." Taking the steps two at a time, Thrum walked into the open archway a little anxious. The further he went inside the further the sounds of the forest went and the forest was safety, but curiosity overpowered his doubts. _Damn no people. There must be something here. Video games don't put oddly colored GLOWING temples in the wrong places for no reason. Unless it's one of those types of games. And this is not one of those types of games. I think it's not at least._ Thrum monologued to himself.

And so he searched the vacant and very barren building. The ground floor and upper floor had nothing of interest. That means, "l have to go down there, huh." Thrum was not amused by this development. Marching into the darkness in an aloof manner, Thrum realized that if an enemy happened to be down there in the basement then he should be a bit more stealthy in his approach. And so moving slowly and with caution, Thrum descended.

The darkness was all encompassing, and the silence more so. Each stair pushed Thrum further from the much more welcoming glow up above. Thrum tried to keep a track on how many steps he was taking, but discarded that to instead throw all of his concentration into being ready for anything.

A red dot down below drew Thrum's attention. The more stone steps he took, the closer it came, and before long Thrum recognized the red dot to be a torch. _Torches!_ Bounding down the last hundred steps or so, Thrum was happy to be under the brilliance of light again. _Now at the ground floor -or well, hopefully l wont need to do anymore descending- l can find out what in the hell is down here!_ Thrum turned from the hot torch and stared at the door at the far end of the hall.

He walked deliberately across the dirt-caked floor and stopped in front of the indigo door. Turning the knob, Thrum pushed the door inwards and stepped inside to be greeted with a grandiose dome-like room. Staring about in awe, Thrum took in the fact that everywhere in the room. . . No, in this amphitheater, are indigo balls of light.

Some small, others large, some pulsing, others solid in being, some flying about the room, others stationary, but all _bright._ The most concentrated of them lying in the center of the room, by an upraised pedestal. Thrum tried to dodge the balls of energy, _magic_ he was sure. But it was too late then. In the time it took for Thrum to marvel the room, a few balls of indigo had stuck to his arms and clothes. Waiting for something terrible to happen, Thrum was grateful to find the magical orbs harmless.

"Okay~." Thrum whispered, and more balls of light stuck to his person. Feeling a rise of confidence, Thrum strode directly to the middle of the amphitheater towards the pedestal. As he approached, the magical lights began to thrash. Becoming more hyper the closer he got. Pressing in with their mass-less energy they created a path directly to the pedestal. Stepping up the three steps, Thrum stood in front of the bare pedestal.

The pillar had a faint glow to it, decorated with swirling lines that looped and stacked, making it seem as if the whole of the structure itself was made of such intricate lines. And thinking about it, this thing may actually of have been made in such a way. Years of work, potentially decades in the hands of someone with enough skill and time, but it here it could be fabricated in seconds. And then it struck him, in this world of fantasy and fiction, ANYTHING could be fabricated. The most beautiful and awe-inspiring things lie in the digital universe. As well as the things of nightmares most definitely.

And it was with those thoughts that Thrum looked around himself, really looked and felt a lot more like Brian. The indigo lights had formed an almost perfect sphere around him, and if he peered hard enough he could see the individual orbs spinning around him, reflecting the same face from the real world. As each orb passed he could see the events of today flash inside them. From his time in darkness, to his fall over the cliff, his arrival and investigation of the temple, to now. Surrounded by orbs of something, spinning and unpredictable. _What are these things really? I assumed magic but how could i know._ Swallowing down the knot resting in his throat, Brian did a full spin, turning and realized that his way out of this sphere's nonexistent. Breathing a little heavier and eyes darting for a way out he felt suddenly very conscious of parts of his body that he hadn't been a few minutes ago. Putting a hand on the pedestal Brian leaned onto it. Raising his other he placed it over his eyes to block his vision, and took a minute to catch his breath.

After taking longer than he'd like to admit Brian looked up and was slightly startled to see the orbs had coalesced into a solid dome of energy around him, but after a second marveled. Reflecting back to him was the same scenes as before but from a different light, a different angle. His own joy as he filled out the creation projection, his glee as he won his first real fight in-game, his poise and focus as he entered the temple. He'd been strong and brave then, so why not now? Brian is Thrum and Thrum is Brian. So if Thrum is strong. _Then I must be strong too._

The spheres of magic had encased Brian, here, in front of this pedestal, but he did not feel trapped anymore. So pushing himself back to his feet, Thrum glanced down at the simple but intricately-made construct. He felt the compulsion to place his hand on it properly now. Thrum raised his dominant hand, his left one, and rested it on the smooth counter of the pedestal. And then in an alarming motion, the indigo lights of magic drew together. These silent orbs, which could not displace air and could not be felt, or noticed besides the fact that they illuminate, drew together. To form a humming ball of heady magic much too near to his face. "Okay, okay. You've had your fun." Thrum said with clenched teeth, it was an effort to keep his hand on the pedestal, and he only did it because something below had caught his eye, glancing down Thrum read the message. A message inscribing itself into the pedestal slowly.

 **Prodigal Warrior**

 **You have traversed the area of your spawn. You have made it here without losing your life. You have discovered this temple. You have completed hidden Launch Quest X. And you shall been rewarded for your skillful accomplishment. You may have one of two rare items. A sword befitting a Warrior of your Level (3). Or gauntlets befitting a Trapper of your Level (3).**

 _Sword or Gauntlets. l can have one or the other , but which will be better? It has to be the gauntlets, right? A sword is run of the mill._ _l can get a sword when things come down to it, but can l get a gauntlet as good as this seems?_ Thrum mulled over his choice before sticking with his gut.

Sword or (Gauntlet)

 **You have made your decision.**

And then in a swirl of indigo light, and immeasurable heat, the altar disappeared and everything became as dark as could be. Everything except for Thrumaticus Thomil's LQX Gauntlets.

_GDFO_

Thrum began walking out of the temple with his new forearm protectors. The gauntlets had dark metal with melding and shifting indigo lines capped with gumdrop-sized ball spikes on the knuckles. Walking out of the grey temple, Thrum felt _good._ The indigo patterns on the gauntlets glowed and danced, and with the once beautiful temple transformed into such a meek and grey visage, Thrum felt as if he had entrapped the essence of the temple inside of his gauntlets; as if he ensnared the will of the temple and is now using it for his own gain.

Reading over the description and buffs of his newest acquisition, Thrum found that the gauntlets are very versatile. An adaptable function for glowing in the dark, minor magical abortion, increased stats to his unarmed strength, reflexes, and even a skill!

Thrum walked down the steps and re-entered the forest, walking aimlessly. For weapon skills to unlock, you must have a certain level in the specific class of weaponry. Meaning short swords, and rapiers have completely different trees for unlocking skills and completely skills all together. Even when the skill has the potential to be unlocking by having a high enough level you must have a skill point to available to unlock said skills. And the only way to get weapon skill points is by upgrading your weapon level.

"Alright so I have three skill points right now, for my three levels, I could spend them now but I do like the idea of saving up and studying the skill trees before i make a decision." He said aloud. "Obtaining skill points doesn't sound very convoluted, but maybe i'm missing something. . . No I must be because why was I able to almost tell foresee danger before i'd come, and the same with my hand."

Flitting through the menu, the Help Menu in particular he was able to slowly but surely realize that even without having a skill, the game will still make you feel as if you should use that skill in an ideal situation. If skill level and skill points for said skill are available.

"I see the application there but, nah, i'm turning that off." With a little searching in the settings he went in and turned that off. The only thing Thrum still didn't understand and couldn't figure out is how he was able to tell when Fuzzball was attacking without actually knowing for sure. _l didn't have any prediction skills then. . l still don't. This is so annoying when you know the information is there but can't find it._

Getting frustrated he checked his skill levels again and smiled, good progress for just one day. Thrum's current level in Unarmed Combat actually exceeds his level in Short Swords. _Must be the fact that i'm not that good with swords and my fights always end up on the ground instead of upright._

Closing the Options Menu Thrum started thinking of a game plan for not being lost. _Heh. Okay so the temple was a bust. So thinking about it maybe I should check that large river, civilization and bodies of water basically go hand and hand so if I could just remember which direction it was in. Y'know what lemme just climb this tree and find out exactly where it is._ Walking up to the largest tree in sight, Thrum prepared to start climbing and vanished.

The bright light faded and the darkness of the forest swallowed it whole.

_GDFO_

Hundreds of players were being teleported in, all different colors and sizes, trying to figure out where they were and why it is that they were brought there. As the hall filled with players ruby red eyes scanned the embroidered hall in disdain. The large pillars of marble were decorated with figures of power (most likely lore friendly but none of the players were really sure). The pristine floor was reflecting the light shining from thousands of glowing orbs of magic in the air. Everything from the walls, to the ceiling, to the finger pastries lining one of the walls screamed upper-class. A small group of mandrakes provided music, with one Echidna as lead singing, their magic amplifying the sounds exponentially. The melodious voice and ambiance was sweeping the large hall, calming the nerves of the near twenty-thousand players appearing from thin air.

The players themselves all seemed overwhelmed by the surreal nature of this grandiose dancing hall but that was understandable. No longer wearing their starting gear, the gamer's found themselves garbed in tuxedos and dresses respectively. Blues, blacks, whites, reds, any combination you could think of were there and she herself practically glided over the ground. When she passed those near she whispered seductively to them, inviting them to dance.

 **Wariness is unnecessary here. Dance. Celebrate your arrival.** The woman whispered as she went, but her voice projected the message clearly. Her countenance was stunning. But her expression was stony, Uncaring. A clear deterrent.

Understanding the message, people began to pair. They danced to the music, and before long the magical undertone of the situation faded. Thousands of people swaying their hips, eating, laughing, and generally having a good time. Even the mages among the crowd couldn't detect the powerful spell that was cast on them. And so pleasant noise enveloped the environment. Pairs swapped partners, and a few of the more ostentatious even told stories of their non-existent conquests in the game so far.

Doubling back and ignoring offers for a dance, the woman surveyed her surroundings. The players that seem to be a bit more suspicious of what in the world was going on gradually dismissed their caution, so with her job done she returned. To them, this must be some kind of launch event.

Her pale skin and dress felt foreign on her body, but she did not show it outwardly. Floating up the steps, she seated herself on her throne, and waited for the opportune moment to draw attention to herself.

_GDFO_

Thrum dropped into the hall wearing a jet black tux. Tensing, Thrum resisted the urge to raise his hands and set his weight firmly. Glancing around the area, he could see the anxiety and confusion on the faces of those around him and felt it creep itself inside of himself.

 _To think l wanted to be around other people so badly, but now that l am l'd rather be out there in the wild._ Thrum scanned over everything: the disheveled people about him, the soothing music fluttering in the air, the food -which made his stomach growl in need- as well as the phantom flowing by. . .

 _What in the freak?_ Thrum was dumbfounded.

Once the phantom lady had passed through the entire atmosphere changed. The players or NPC around him became so at ease and he felt it slowly but surely seep into his own muscles. Inconveniently the music piqued and Thrum was dragged into a spiraling dance with a pretty older woman with -thankfully- tan skin and shoulder-length brown hair. The mismatched couple spun smoothly, "lsn't this interesting, such an amazing launch event?!" The woman asked with a dazzling smile.

"Er. . Yeah? l'm sorry but l thought everyone here was non-player characters. Do you know what's going on?" Thrum asked.

"No. But that's okay, because l am sure in a bit she will tell us." The lady, who seems to be in her late thirties, said referring to the phantom from earlier. And then she was gone. The music's tempo had changed slightly, signifying to every person there that it is time change partners, and so Thrum had lost one, for another.

This went on for the next hour or so. Dance, dance, switch partner, dance some more. Thrum tried his hardest to interrogate his partners, and while some seemed unconcerned and ditzy, others were very helpful/pressed for information themselves. Realizing that he is in the wrong place to gather info, and scanning for his friends along the way, Thrum maneuvered his way to the 'food wall' as some had called it while he danced.

For some reason, dietary needs are a thing in this game. As Thrum made his way to the punch bowl he realized that he and his lover had ordered food in real life as a matter of fact. _Maybe my real life hunger is seeping into the game? A good addition to keep people from playing for too long at a time._ _l don't know how logging in works in this game. l'll just get to a secluded spot by the food and logout there._ Thrum decided to himself on the way.

Just as he found a good place to chill, Thrum saw a familiar face. Josh! Erm. . Ultorem?

_GDFO_

Ultorem turned from his plate of white pastries. The pointed stare of eyes from somewhere making him tense slightly. A dark skin male, black hair, tall, and those unmistakable facial features.

 _Json, or Thrumaticus Thomil? Mouthful of a name._

"Hey Thrumaticus. l see you got here in one piece." Ultorem said, as Thrum approached.

"Thrum is fine," Thrum's grin widened. "ULTOREM." He said with wide emphasis.

They shared a smile at their fanciful names. One down, about eight more to go. Give or take if their friends have found each other or not.

"Have you seen The Crew?" Thrum asked.

"No. And i'm assuming you haven't either. Have you heard about the ultra-rare launch drops? Apparently if you search the area of your spawn and beat the other players to your terrain's temple you can get one. Though it must be over now with this launch party the Devs are throwing right now." Ultorem asked/said. He himself had to fight tooth and nail underground to get his hands on the dagger that he has now. _Though it's nice to see my name labeled in it's name._ He thought to himself.

"Yeah, l got my hands on a sweet pair of. . .WAIT MY GEAR!" Frantically Thrum opened his menu to check his Inventory for his arm gloves.

"Your gear is in your lnventory alright, it was the first thing l checked before coming here to chill." Ultorem left out the whole berating bit, even if Thrum forgot to check if he still has his stuff and simply enjoyed the party. Really the only reason he didn't make fun is because its just them until they find their other friends.

"Yeah okay, okay, l gotchu. But even still l gotta jet for a bit to get some food in my stomach. Sarah and l ordered pizza and who knows if the guy showed up already." Thrum checked his lnventory for his stuff anyways, before searching for the way to logout. Coming up empty he asked Ultorem for some help.

And so for the next couple of minutes the two teens searched frantically for the logout button, referring to the Help Menu for a bit before giving up on that in frustration. Just as Thrum was going to swallow his pride and ask one of the many party goers about, their attention gots siphoned to the disgustingly-beautiful woman at the end of the dance hall.

_GDFO_

 **Radia** drew the attention of everyone in the hall with her delicate and magically-enhanced voice.

 **"Greetings Areaians, My name is Azura Rivera and l have been working on this game for years. This is my world, my baby.**

Everyone in the hall had gone silent, even the ambient music has dwindled away.

 **I have inhabited the body of one of this game's goddesses to bring this message to you. Some of you may have realized that there is no logout feature in the menu. This is no bug, this is no mistake. After waiting for all twenty-thousand players to log into the game, l think it is time, time to re-create that** _ **precious**_ **existence that was Sword Art Online. You must have seen this coming, somewhere in your heart you must of seen this as a possibility, and yet. Yet you are still here, that bravery will be invaluable soon. Invaluable and misguided." She smiled for the first time then.**

As she spoke, players all throughout the hall were losing their smiles. Making a bit of space between themselves and their peers. Without a pause in her speech, Azura flicked her hand, causing those who happened to be closest to her to flinch inadvertently. Like a wave, the formal dress that everyone of them had been wearing disappeared, starting from the throne and spreading all the way to the players in the back. Now garbed in their best gear, Azura continued.

 **Today is a day to be remembered. If by nobody else but you. There is no escape from this world besides the defeat of fifty bosses in this world. Each exponentially stronger and more difficult than the last. Tread wisely because there are no safe-zones in this world as well. Only through special exceptions can you sleep soundly, and even then there will be a severe cost. Finally, do not forget to beware your fellow players. . .** Azura's smile became that of a snake, the wary looks each of the players gave towards one another making it hard to believe that they had been dancing and enjoying the company of each others, and she loved it.

 **For they may be the makers of your demise.**

Staring at Azura stupidly, the severity of the situation did not sink into the minds of the Areaians until one woman spoke. With the dead silence, her voice carried a lot farther than it typically would of have.

"Y-You cannot be serious? A woman of your prestige and standard would nev-"

And all of the eyes on the brown-haired woman speaking widened. From behind, in the middle of her speech she'd been stabbed. A sickening squelch, and whimper sounded. And then the sound of a body falling limp to the floor splashed surprise and fear in the face of those who could hear but not see. There was no explosion of lights, no chime of death. Some of the players present had seen other players die earlier. This scene they saw now wass completely different from what they saw before. A dead player's body would usually disappear and they would re-materialize with a sheepish smile.

There shouldn't be a pool of blood. Or a bloodied dagger. The dagger of an assassin!

Not a sound peeped.

Not one.

Until a shrill, incoherent scream filled the air.

All at once the hall became a rush of motion, people going for the doors, windows, anyway they could manage they would find and use it. Some were killed for gear for a head start on their life, others because of panicky fright. The world became a mass of chaos then. Most if not all had read articles of the SAO survivors, of what they had to do, what they went through and subconsciously they knew it was their fate now to relive it with more modern technology.

The noise was chaotic and broken, with all the rhythm of white noise but Azura loved it. Nothing was guaranteed or set in stone for anyone there, the world was devolving into hell and the only true constant that could be found was Azura's smile.

_GDFO_

A man with brown hair waited at the door of an apartment patiently. He had been waiting here for a few minutes now. Pizza in hand, the man raised his other to his head and scratched at the red bandanna tied there.

 _Whoever's in there must not like pizza that much. . ._

 _Or maybe they prank called? l'm not sure. . ._

Shuffling about nervously, the man hesitated, go back to the car or wait here a bit longer.

After knocking again and still getting nothing the man cut his losses and left. In his opinion if you're not hungry enough to open your door, you must not be all that hungry in the first place.

But he couldn't keep himself from shaking a feeling of déjà vu as he walked to his car.

_GDFO_

 **Authors note: Big thank you to Kipopo for being my beta in this chapter. :v**

 **And that just about does it for this chapter guys! Did you enjoy it, are you curious about what's going to happen next? Find out next time on- Ahem never mind. Lets keep it simple and short shall we. I update every week, this week l was a bit early, and dont forget to review. They make me happy. Jason signing out!**

 **Uploaded September 12th, 2016**

 **Updated January 27th, 2018**


	3. Out Of The Frying Pan

**Hey, hey guys Jason here, and I'm back with another chapter of The Salient. I kinda left you guys off on a cliff-hanger last chapter, so l'll be sure to get a lot of action in this chapter. Besides all that, stick around for the A.N. at the bottom. And do me the favor of enjoying the damn chapter! This shit takes time and effort man~**

 **Chapter 3: Out Of The Frying Pan. . .**

_GDFO_

Bodies litter the floor. And from them came a metallic scent. An unmistakeable, tongue coating, STENCH. The taste of metal made even the most stoic among them grimace. They acted like sharks getting a first glimpse of the blood they _knew_ was there. Which is to say that the dead players about the stained hall frenzied those still among the living.

Windows shattered, people screamed their anguish to the Heavens, as if beseeching the occupants of the sky to save them. Boots, helmets, swords, shields, _arms, legs,_ _ **people.**_ They all littered the floor. A sticky *shlick* sounded whenever someone took a step. And the overpowering scent of vomit tickled at the senses.

This is hell without brimstone and fire. Without the darkness of the night, but under the luminous lighting of magic. Some had managed their way out of the main hall, but for the unfortunate, the center of the dance hall engulfed their world. Kingster found himself entrapped in the middle of this chaos.

_GDFO_

King had dropped into GDFO at 8pm precisely and after deciding on being practical for his first character, he choose Tank for his main and Mage for his secondary. After spending a good thirty minutes enjoying life (an absolute overload of the senses will do that), and the beautifully cool-grassy plains he spawned in, Kingster decided to read that annoying system notification and learned how to open his menu. King spent a fair amount of time going through the Options Menu and practically memorized exactly where everything is.

Equipping the shield that he spawned with, Kingster went out in search for something to fight. This is what he had been waiting for all of his life. _This glorious universe!_ A world in which he can physically adventure an entirely new world, exactly like the two and three dimensional games he played before. Games that he will most likely never play again.

Kingster enjoyed his (unknown to him) grace period.

Fumbling the pronunciation of the two spells he was given with his magery class, the player tested the waters on his magery skills. Instinctively he knew the motions, build up mana, elementally transform it, and then expel it from the body. Knowing the motions and being able to execute them are two different matters entirely though.

After a bit, King found he had enough of a hang of his spells, and their curious pronunciation, to take his newly found skills into battle.

 _aqua_ and _ignis,_ water and fire. King found the minor spells to be more trouble than they were worth. The reason for that being the system's assist,King would unconsciously try to whisper the words for one of his available spells whenever in a combat situation. King would be trying to concentrate on mouthing the words, and would leave himself an easy target for any aggressors. A while later, King turned off that function, for a mage like him it can only be distracting.

The fact that the Tank class also seems to be a stationary class doesn't help the matter. Though in contrast to that is the fact that the Tank class is very useful in regards to having plenty of health points and decent in-battle regen.

King studiously played about with the different battle strategies, using the shield for cover and pelting the low-level boars in the area with spells. Trying to use the terrain to his advantage, which failed spectacularly. King even tried being more proactive, unequipping some of his heavier gear and shield. This _kinda_ worked, King took less damage, slipping around the much slower Plain Boars and slapping them with his spells. The only drawback being that King would have to focus much harder, and if he lost concentration, he would still lost the mana for the spell, but wouldn't reap any of the rewards of using his meager mana stores.

 _l think if l can master moving and using spells, l can be really good at this game. Maybe the best in The Crew for a game like this._ Kingster thought to himself, sitting on the rough surface of a rock. The Crew has had a long running competitive streak in it, each of the members gloating their superiority over the other whenever they could. As a group of steady gamers, their skill in the games they play mean quite a bit to them.

Staring at the orange sky, King began to wonder where The Crew was now. lf they had a good first day in. _l wonder what class is my weakness. It's not in the Options Menu. . . actually a lot of information is missing from the Help/Options Menu._

King paused his tumultuous thoughts to enjoy the quietness of the moment, but could not help but question the integrity of the world around him. For a videogame that took anywhere up to ten years, it has a lacking feel to it. _l wonder what classes everyone else choose. Will l respawn here after l log out? Why am l getting hungry, where do l get food? Why would the game spawn me all the way out here in the wilderness?_

Scratching his head, Kingster realized that there are many things in this game that he does not understand. Like mapping. A world map did not come as a part of King's Inventory, as well as a messaging system. It's as if the developers didn't want the players to have any sort of way to contact or re-group with their friends.

King suppressed the urge to open his Options Menu again. Rising to his feet, Kingsterboy made the split-second decision to not kill more of the local wildlife and manage his way to a town or city.

There must be one somewhere around here, King looked about as if for a directional indication, King felt a light engulf his person.

And left like he arrived he vanished, in a flash of light.

_GDFO_

King wished he could go back to that simple existence of the plains.

King swirled about in a never-ending spin. Shield upraised and ready to defend himself. That woman -the catalyst as players abroad would refer to her- died fairly near to him. King raised his large iron shield in front of himself towards the aggressor, backing up slowly.

The killer stepped over her body and advanced on Kingster, and was promptly mauled by a horde of players appalled by his actions. The idea of a person dying in real life had not sunk in. Only much would the Areaians of this world realize that their actions had severe consequences, but tonight the bodies sprawled about were sickening to look at, and promoted a fear of being sucked into such a predicament. But did only just that, the pathos, the sympathy that everyone should feel. It's overshadowed by the rulings of the mob.

King raised his shield in front of his face to block the sight, and moved in a slow circle to find the nearest route of escape.

 _l'm so far!_ King thought to himself.

Deciding to put his shield to work, King bowled over a pair of players locked in mortal combat. King pushed onwards though the crowd. Ignoring the people shaving off bits of his health, he used his heavy shield as a battering ram.

The magi players there either found themselves dead because they tried to use a spell and left themselves open, or didn't bother using their magic at all. King saw the effects of the former and choose the latter.

Kingster bullied his way through the crowd, pushing aside those who would stand in his way and doing his best to swerve around the other Tanks in the process. Ignoring the fact that his health has never dropped this low before King pushed on to the windows just a bit farther away.

As King drew closer to the window, he saw a familiar face. Tball! King rushed towards his friend and shuddered. The basic Assassin garb. Black everything, gloves, scarf, boots, jacket, and hood. Most of the Assassins in the beginning of the chaos had been killed. On the basic principal that they will stab you in the back without a seconds hesitation. The discriminant clothes that they wear, and vicious way in which they are being _slaughtered_ pushed the assassins to work together in a silent agreement.

An older man is trying to keep up that running custom, in killing Kingster's friend Tball.

Locked the the throes of battle, neither player expected King to shoulder-check the guy. Tball took advantage of the situation and dropped to his knees, plunging his blade into the man's neck, killing him in a fluid motion.

Tball raised to his feet with a grimace on his blood splattered face. "Hey King."

The only reason they recognized each other from the get go is because of their usernames, Kingster and Tball Skulls. Players who saw the proceedings avoided the pair of obvious companions, sneering at the fact that a Tank had saved a Assassin.

"Tball take my potions." King raised his shield to protect them both and flitted his hand though the menu. Plucking out the potions inside he handed them to Tball who downed them quickly.

"My HP was getting low, thanks King. Lets get outta here." Tball eyed up the window only a few yards away. lgnoring King's betrayed blanch, Tball explained.

"Tball l don't know-" King closed his mouth when Tball spoke again.

"The others will get out," _they have to._ Tball finished to himself in worry.

"But we have to escape now before someone decides our gear would look better on them." At Kingster's solemn nod, they moved. At first awkwardly but always efficiently. By now a fair majority of the fighting had ended, the frenzy of so many people all panicking at once had dwindled.

Nobody wanted to stay in a hall of despair and death and so the thousands of people remaining focused on _getting out,_ or at least most of them.

Jumping out of the window one after the other, Tball and Kingster were met with midnight darkness. "Keep moving, the further we are from the building the better." Tball told King still jogging forwards.

Together they moved away from the bright lights of the hall, into the darkness.

_GDFO_

Bendazi ran through the trees quietly. Everyone wanted to get as far away from that palace as possible. Daniel ducked behind a tree and took a few deep, calming breaths. Raising his head, Daniel tried to take solace in the fact that he can't hear the sounds of players anymore.

 _F-four times. . . l nearly died four times because of THIS!_ Daniel Swain removed his starting assassin's gear and put it into his lnventory. Temporary buffs be damned.

Charles 'Bendazi' Rancliff had spawned on the shore, not realizing that he actually had spawned on one of the world's islands. Using his bow and dagger Bendazi killed quite a few of the low level monsters in the area, and was more than a little surprised that instead of killing an Alpha Crab Dragon, he was re-spawned inside of a fanciful dancing hall from the early 20th century. Except instead of wood floors you had a near mirror-like material, and instead of support beams of wood, you got elaborate columns of marble.

Getting over his surprise, Bendazi watched from near the food wall. Turning down requests from strangers to dance, watching as the awkward atmosphere slowly turned comfortable, and then to deathly silent. Before beginning its descent into madness.

Hearing that piercing scream, Bendazi moved to jump through a convenient window about a dozen feet away. As one of the first people to move, on top of that if you add in that he is dressed in his assassin gear, Bendazi became immediately suspect.

If his level wasn't at four already and his ears were not so keen, then Bendazi would've died a, not so spectacular, death. Ducking the warrior's sword, and spinning in one fluid motion, Bendazi slashed the offenders jugular in one smooth turn. And because his hood is so obscuring, no one saw how disgusted with himself he appeared.

To them, a player _rightfully_ tried to destroy an assassin, but was cut down like a lamb. And to add insult to injury that assassin is still lording over his conquest, his victory like some perverse vanquisher.

Bendazi did not get out of the dancing hall until later, effectively quicker than his friends, but later still.

Rising to full height, Bendazi swept his blood-caked hair back. Daniel thought about checking to see if there really is no way to logout, still slightly unsure. He quickly discarded that idea, the light from the Options Menu would be much too luminous in the pitch-black night.

Bendazi moved deeper into the sparse forest. Wincing slightly at the crunch of leaves and whispers of the air. Bendazi walked for what felt like half an hour, but could only be a fraction of that in reality. Breaching the end of the forest, Bendazi stared in amazement.

From his spot, he could see mountains, huge constructs of earth. Rivers, lakes, valleys, a dessert, some sort of light reflecting off the moon. .an ocean. And at the edge of Bendazi's keen vision lays another forest, but from here the details are difficult to spot. Stupefied by the beauty for a minute, Bendazi shook off his amazement and studied his predicament.

 _How am l supposed to get down?_ The man looked about his immediate area and from the looks of it this palace, this settlement of land, has no base. The hill that they were teleported onto does not support itself like the mountains abroad. No, the players of this world we're teleported onto a floating island. And then for the second time that day, he found himself engulfed in the light of a forced teleportation.

 _Oh god. Please not again._ Bendazi's pleas to be let alone were ignored. When the light faded, he was no longer there.

_GDFO_

Thrum and Ultorem shared a look during Azura's speech, and the look one shared conveyed the same message the other was trying to give. _Wherever this is going, it cannot be good._

And then as Azura's speech was coming to a close, someone much too far away began speaking. Thrum couldn't hear what the person said, but Ultorem could. His heightened hearing allowed him to hear all of what she said before being cut off.

"Thrum, we gotta get out of here now!" Ultorem whispered harshly.

"What? What's going-" Thrum shut his mouth quickly when he heard a woman scream at the top of her lungs. And watched in horror as people started running for the exits available, trampling over each other if someone is in their way. Andthen people started to die, or more accurately, those who choose to be assassins.

"Thrum, we have to go now!"

Ultorem had long since drawn his dagger. Thrum turned to his friend and looked on with fright, Ultorem is dressed exactly like a majority of the killers. An assassin.

"Josh, what the fuck happened up there?!" Thrum never got his answer to that particular question.

Ultorem had laid his back to the food table, hoping to use it to protect his rear. A player who had managed to flee the derangement at the center of the hall took one look at his attire and tackled him from behind.

"Fuck!" Ultorem turned mid-fall and tried to throw off the assailant, but the guy was much too heavy.

"Die Assassin! Just die all of you!" The spiky-haired man straddling Ultorem raised his axe. He tried to plunge the blade into Ultorem, but Thrum tackled him before he could raise his weapon up.

Thrum grabbed the man's wrist and snapped it with a crunch. Pinning his arms Thrum used his greater strength to pin him to the floor. The man, who actually looks to be closer to Thrum's age than he thought, thrashed and hissed in anger.

"Get off me, get off, that fucking _assassin_ deserves to die!" Thrum nearly lost his grip with the way the teen wiggled. The way he hissed assassin, it was like a curse.

"You're not going to kill my friend!" Thrum grunted in brevity.

Ultorem stood above the struggling pair and watched guard. _We can't stick around like this, even if we are a bit out of the way, they're eyeing us._

"Thrum, knock him out we have to leave." Ultorem kept his dagger raised and his body tensed, he lost his focus for a second and this happened.

Thrum grunted in agreement and brought his gauntlet down in a powerful smash, knocking the tanned teenager out. Hopping off of him to his feet, Thrum waited for Ultorem to give direction, he had plenty of time to observe after all.

"We can't go that way, even though there are windows really close there. I think an assassin player killed the woman who was trying to plead our case," Ultorem pointed in the direction of Azura and her throne, which nobody seemed keen on getting close to. That also happened to be the direction in which the chaos began and is most prominent.

"Well, only one way out then, huh," Thrum turned away from the bulk of the chaos and faced the opposite direction. Not much better, but better nonetheless. "Let's go then."

Thrum followed Ultorem, doggedly tailing behind him. Ultorem scooped up a deceased player's shield and used it protect himself somewhat, but even so, the much stronger Thrum had to do the bulk of the way clearing. Thrum filled his hands with iron swords and busied himself with flailing them about threateningly at whoever thought it would be a good idea to tangle with them, which wasn't very many. Working in tandem, the pair slipped around tougher knots of players and bruised their way through the weaker ones.

For a solid ten minutes all the world consisted of was survival. And for some reason it was easier than it should've been. Ultorem would use his superior reflexes to dip and dodge around his opponents, and slash and hack at their exposed sides and back until they attempted to escape. And he would let them.

Thrum abandoned one of his swords to have a hand free at all times. Slipping into an aggressors guard, he would bruise them with his gauntlet, and with its proficiency in close range and the cramped spacing of the hall, Thrum found himself in the kill zone. A sword to keep the masses away was nice as well, but Thrum never allowed himself to drop an enemy below half HP.

As the pair pushed on, less and less people found it in themselves to keep fighting. Jumping over another dead carcass, Thrum waited for both Ultorem and a break in the wave of people to continue. Feeling a gnawing bite somewhere behind his eyes, Thrum clenched his fists and readied himself for another confrontation.

Ultorem broke away from his fight to return to Thrum's side.

"Thrum, let's keep moving. We only have a bit further to go." Ultorem pants with exertion.

". . . Yeah alright." Thrum felt his danger sense fade and nodded in agreement to his compatriot.

The final sprint to the window was easy, mostly because those closest to said window were not sticking around to pick a fight. Ultorem went first dropping out of the window, his class just doesn't have as much health as Thrum's, which is why he proceeded before Thrum. Even as an Assassin, Ultorem was slightly blinded by the swift change in lighting. Crouching, Josh waited for his schoolmate and brother-in-arms.

Thrum stood guard for Ultorem as he gauged the distance he'd have to drop before hitting the ground. As Thrum waited, he surveyed the people still fighting. Seeing nothing noteworthy, Thrum turned his back on the madness of the bloody hall.

To get pinned to the wall by a much heavier woman.

"You beat one of my charges unconscious. Stomp along with an _assassin_ of all players. And nearly kill my brother. A player like you could potentially kill many of people. So I'll save us the future headache."

The gruff woman was hit with by a dark spectre of vengeance before she could make good on her promise.

"Next time you jump out the window first, honestly l leave you alone for a minute and you're getting your ass kicked by a damn gorilla." Ultorem rubbed his shoulder and eyed up the -ahem- very large woman in front of them. Note to self, don't tackle a woman who weighs about sixty pounds more than you.

Severe scowl, tanned skin, level ten, heavy armor -though the shield customary of a Tank is absent-, straight back, long grey-black hair, and a thick hammer in one hand. This woman could be the sample they used for a stereotypical disapproving mother. Wait level what. .?

Between the pair of them, Thrum and Ultorem barely scraped together level ten. "Hey Josh."

"Game's mostly PvP centered." Ultorem said, regretting not killing a few of those players back there. Raising his unique dagger, Ultorem prepared himself mentally for a _much_ more difficult battle.

Thrum looked over to his friend, Ultorem gave away nothing under his scowl. Opting for humor, Thrum said, "Uhuh, the next time some crazy-ass kid pins you to the ground and shouts 'Long live the king!' I'll make sure to leave you to it." Thrum grinned back, cracking his knuckles in false bravado.

As if defying the impossible, the woman's scowl deepened.

"I'm happy the kids are with Alice and won't hear me say this," The woman flexed and creaked the iron armor protecting her person. "Cause you fucked up saying that pretty boy."

_GDFO_

Today is the worst day of Houten's life. As well as first. . and best. Through that logic today is alot of things.

Murphy dropped into GDFO and filled out his customization sheet. After checking it over, he submitted the form and bit his lip at the slight change in scenery. His eyes were already adjusted to the darker lighting, so Wolfgang Van Houten did not stand about. The earthy scent made Houten's nose twitch and he sneezed a lot during his time underground.

He knew he was underground because of the enclosed, silent tunnels everywhere he walked. The strong scent of dust and dirt-like feel of the walls around him confirmed as much. And so alone, in the dusky tunnels Houten walked. Not encountering a soul in sight, Houten strolled through the tunnels, gaining his bearings on the Options Menu all the while.

"Hello!" Houten paused as his voice echoed along the passageway. "Is anybody there?!"

Houten cleared his throat, too much dust. Nothing responded to his call. By this point, Houten had already made a few turns, changing direction into different tunnels, hoping to stumble his way to the surface.

"Did l just get a bad spawn? This is fustrating." Houten raised his voice at the end, hoping to attract someone's notice. Still no answer forthcoming, Houten returned his attention to the menu illuminating his way.

At first, he didn't notice. But after a bit, the fact that the menu seemed a bit shorter than he remembered made Houten stop. Checking, checking, and rechecking, Houten couldn't for the life of him figure out what in the hell is missing. Until his stomach growled and Murphy wondered about what his mother would be making for dinner. It was only then, as Murphy was daydreaming about food, that he realized a logout feature is missing.

Speaking out loud in the wishful manner of finding anyone, Houten spoke his mind out loud. In contrast of his usual style of keeping his opinion to himself. "Where did the 'Logout' button go? Where's the Logout prompt!?"

Staring in disbelief, Murphy began to get worried, and so in a bid to be proactive about the situation, turned to head back the way he came.

"Maybe it's like some other games work? You can only save in certain places, and logout of the game in others?! Right? Right?!" Murphy turned on his heel and sped his way along, ready to backtrack as far as necessary to get the logout button back.

"Hey." A foreign sound startled Murphy.

"W-what!" Murphy whirled around and instinctively unsheathed his sword from his back.

Houten heard the person shrouded in darkness shuffle backwards, and listened to the feminine person assure him of her amicability.

"l'm sorry! Please don't hurt me." The teenage girl opened her own menu to reveal her presence further.

Houten dropped his half sheathed sword into its holster and straightened his back. Getting a good look at the brunette, Houten smiled uneasily. The girl looked a bit younger than Houten, fifteen or so if he had to guess. Kinda skinny, but in a cute way. And _very_ pale skin, accentuating her dark brown hair, giving the younger female an ethereal appearance. Houten took just as long to appraise her Gamertag, as he did her body. Merida.

"Don't," Houten took a deep breath to calm his nerves. He expected someone to eventually heed his call. Not a _girl_ though, especially not a _cute girl._ "Don't worry about it, you just scared me. ."

An awkward pause swallowed their words, and if it could it'd swallow them too.

"Um. Do you know the way out of this dungeon. . um Wolfgang von Hotten? l do not know the way to the surface." The petite girl asked.

"Van Houten. You can just call me Houten though, or Murphy if you like. It's my real name." Houten paused before continuing. "l don't know the way out. But do you still have the logout button in your menu? Mine is bugged."

Houten peered at her Options Menu, trying to decipher the illegible block of text by hip.

 _That doesn't look english. ls it. . oh l get it it's coded! In this game one player can't peer into the menu of another._ Houten thought to himself leaning away from her.

What Houten did not know is that a player's Options Menu can be seen by another. Through a few select means.

"Yeah, it's right heere." Merida stared in horror at the fact that her Logout button was not 'heeere'.

"What's going on, l swear it was here just a moment ago." Merida closed and re-opened her menu to see that nothing had changed. "But what do we do then Murphy? l need to get back to the real world soon."

The distraught look on her face made Houten's heart sink.

"Listen, l think we're just too far from the spawn zone. In some games, if you're not at certain checkpoints then you can't save and leave. l was retracing my steps just now, we can go together." Houten smiled in his best convincing smile and Merida looked skeptical.

"l-l don't play many games in real life. l don't have any actually, this was a gift." Merida looked absolutely lost, and sounded like it too. Houten realized that he'd have to be the driving hope for the both of them if this is going to work.

"Just stick with me, we'll find a way out better if we work together." Murphy took Merida's hand and walked past her, dragging her the way she came.

Merida looked at their hands, the hands that were clasped in each others. Flushing scarlet, Merida smiled and let Murphy lead on in the first companionable silence they'd had yet.

_GDFO_

Houten lead with his Options Menu as a flashlight. The two spells he had _ignis_ and _aqua,_ are inadequate for lighting. Houten tried. The basic spells used a bit of mana and fired a plum-sized ball of clear or fiery energy. Not very effective when it comes to sustaining a light source in the darkness of the caverns. They walked in the dark for minutes on end, deciding together on which directions to take and generally how crappy their spawn happened to be. A bulk of their walking occurred in deafening silence, punctuated by their hand-holding.

"Um, Murphy, you don't have to hold my hand all the way. l won't be left behind." Merida said.

"Huh. Oh! Sorry, l'm not treating you like you're helpless, it's just. . ." Houten dropped her hand as if it had scalded his own, keeping his gaze firmly forward. _l hope she can't see my blush from there._

Merida ignored the fact that the warmth in her hand was fading already. Merida looked down to her own Options Menu, trying to focus on the task at hand but was interrupted by Houten's words.

"Hey, why did you name yourself Merida?" Houten asked.

"Um. I loved this old movie from before l was born. Brave, its an old Pixar movie, you've probably never heard of it, but back then, ya know, it was pretty popular, and there was this one girl, the main character actually, and I just. . l loved her attitude." Merida finished lamely.

"I think my dad made me watch Brave when l was younger. The girl with the red hair?" Houten asked with brevity, and Merida simply nodded. "And you loved her?" Houten asked.

"l love her yeah. Her name is Merida and l wish l had HER personality instead of my own." Merida explained.

"I think your personality is really nice." Both of the teenagers flushed brighter than a tomato then.

And before things could get _really_ awkward, their ears pricked at a distant sound.

_GDFO_

A wide berth had been made for the two factions preparing to fight. A pair of players who had beaten the snot out of groups almost three times their size, and a woman who could make an adult Gorilla reconsider fighting her.

The only group of people who seemed to be staying fairly close to the ensemble about to battle is a smallish clique, they had only just arrived a half-minute ago. One kind looking adult woman, and a handful of pre-teens, and a few younger teens. One of the teenagers is holding a bundle to his chest, a spiky-haired bundle that looks similar to that kid Thrum knocked out. In the nicest way of saying it, the group looked vulnerable. Easy prey for any wayward asshole to take advantage of. But Madre Grande makes all of those points moot.

"See your first mistake warrior," The woman said.

Looking above her head for a Username, Thrum and Ultorem found nothing. Thrum scrunched his brow in frustration. A fight to the death at a time like this altogether sounded stupid and unnecessary, especially when the living are in peril. His friends being the most important amoungst them.

"Her level is too high for us to see, it's an optional setting in your Options Menu. To make your name non-existent to players of a much lower level than you." Ultorem explained to Thrum under his breath.

"So her level is so high we can't see it," Thrum had tried his hardest to not think about the others, especially Sarah. But as time wore on and more bodies lied lifeless, it became more difficult to believe that all of his friends came out of this ordeal unscathed.

"Grand, l get to die to a nameless gorilla woman, exactly how l expected the launch to turn out. When all a guy wants to do is find his girlfriend and get the fuck out!" Json said out loud in an outburst of anger.

Josh looked over to his friend. _The fact that Sarah is nowhere to be found must be really wearing on him if he let himself lose his cool like that._

"Thrum, she's ok, just calm down. Think about now. If you die, it won't matter if she's ok or not." Ultorem consoled in the lacking amount of time they had left before talking became a detriment. Josh wanted to say so much more, but time is a commodity they just don't have at the moment.

"So you have someone important to you trapped in here as well? l will be sure to let them know about your demise. It'd be a shame to leave one half of a couple confused about the location and well being of the other." The woman gloated, knowing that the pair of boys were waiting on her to make the first move.

Thrum took an unconscious glance at the floor around him and winced at the sight. Flinching and raising his sight high enough to no longer see the ground Thrum bit his inner cheek before clenching his teeth in a rush of confidence. l _don't have time for anymore of this wait and talk bullshit._ "You wanna fight? Let's make this quick." Thrum declared. Impatience overriding his judgment he raised his sword, sharing a quick glance with Ultorem, Thrum conveyed his message. _I've got more health than you, so l charge. Do your thing while l distract her._

Ultorem blinked in assent.

Thrum launched himself forward, sword first, in a horizontal backhand slash. The group behind the woman tensed in concern, but didn't move. Using his bulk Thrum tried to guard the fact that Ultorem is mirroring his rush like a shadow.

 _Shadow Walker._ Ultorem chanted in his mind.

Ultorem activated the one of the two skills he has, his clothes becoming harder to spot as it blended partially with the color scheme of the hall around them. And at the speed he's moving, if you weren't looking for him, you'd probably miss him. But the woman _was_ watching for him, problem is she couldn't do much about it.

Thrum opened with few testing slashes, trying his hardest to get behind her. *Clang, clang clang* But the woman knew her weakness and covered it to the best of her ability. Almost constantly turning the woman focused on Thrum. Using her warhammer as a ward, the woman and Thrum moved in a killer's dance.

Thrum orbiting her and shaving health away, with her landing half-hits and near-misses that would deal a half-dozen of Thrum's strikes in one. Ultorem imitated Thrum's shadow and waited for his opportunity. Which had to come quickly because _Shadow Walker_ drains mana much too fast for Ultorem to sustain for long periods of time, and so it did.

Changing directions abruptly, Thrum tried to catch the woman in a slash in one of her armor's chinks, she was ready for it this particular time. Swinging her hammer at waist level, the woman aimed for Thrum's solar plexus. Raising his iron sword vertically Thrum planted his feet and tried to stop the blow cold.

*SNAP!*

The sword snapped and in slow motion to Thrum, the hammer continued its path at a much lessened speed.

"Ugh!" The hammer smashed into Thrum's chest and took his breath away, throwing him back violently. Thrum crumpled in a heap, vision dimmed and gripping onto consciousness just barely. But the opening it gave Ultorem was perfect. Not sparing a glance back to his compadre, Ultorem slid past and around to the back of the flat-footed giant. He could feel his body invigorate itself with energy, the second skill passively activating. _Natural Backstabber._

Ultorem had instantly fell in love with his Launch Quest IV dagger. A leather perfectly-sized handle, with curved zig-zag blade, and an obsidian pommel. A construct of pure destruction. Death personified. And Josh is more than happy to use it on her, a woman who, on the basic principal of him being an assassin, decided to attack them. Who made a conscious decision to hurt and hate a man because he saved his friend's life. This woman.

 _No, this thing!_ Josh declared to himself internally. _Can. Not. Be. Left. Alive._

Bringing the powerful dagger up to his chest, Ultorem found a perfect spot to bury his weapon, a gap in the woman's armor loosened by Thrum's efforts. Sending the blade forward in a killer's arc, Ultorem flashed a brilliant white.

And disappeared.

_GDFO_

Merida glued her hip to Houten's, figuratively. As they pressed forward into the piercing abyss, the sounds they heard grew from a whisper to a chatter. To Houten the dialect he could hear was inhuman, the gruff grunts much too low, and what could only be conversation had an interesting pitch change as they spoke. Whatever is up ahead isn't human, which probably meant it is a hostile monster that dwells in these caverns. Monsters, if Houten's guess proved true, though he really did not want it to be.

"Murphy, what are we going to do when we get to where we are going?" Merida asked in a low tone.

"l'm not sure, but if we're lucky, things won't be too bad when we get there. It really can't get much worse than it's been, right?" Houten replied, ever optimistic in their chances of survival. Even with his optimism, as they grew closer, Houten drew his iron sword.

During their brief chatter, they had made it close enough to confirm that yes, there is in fact more than one voice speaking, definately inhuman voices at that. But when Houten drew his sword, the shrill screech of metal on metal made all conversing cease. Rounding a bend, Houten and Merida stopped dead in their tracks.

Eyes peered at them from everywhere ahead. In a much wider range than what the tunnel they were passing though should allow. Which means the tunnel opens up here. Peridot eyes, the eyes of a nocturnal beast, stared at the pair. Unblinking and unmoving.

Then a sound chattered out rapidly from the dark. Houten and Merida stood transfixed in fright. The sound came again, but closer this time, slightly different in style but more comprehensible this time, more comprehensible to at least one of the pair.

"N-no we mean y-you no harm." The last word came out much higher than Merida meant it to be.

The gruff voice was now only a few feet away. Guffawing, the voice made an unsettling noise, that the others imitated cruelly. Something blunt hit another blunt object, making the pair of humans jump. A few seconds later, all of the glowing eyes dimmed, and white overhead lights beamed down from the ceiling.

The beasts now under the lighting could be scrutinized. And for a good half minute the two parties, one intruding and the other hosting, stared at each other.

 _They look like gnomes._ Murphy thought to himself.

Except these gnomes have dark soot-stained skin. Beady green eyes, bulging muscles and a height defect of impressive quality. The tallest of them clocked in at almost four feet, and the shortest looked like a toddler. But the beard told a different story, they all had a gangly chin hair. Of varying sizes and length, but all dirty. A byproduct of all the work that they do here.

"You all must have lived here for close to a century to turn a barren cavern like this into such an industrial wonderland." Merida said in amazement.

And industrialized it is. The sheer size of the domed room compared to the claustrophobic tunnels they'd traversed skewed their perception a bit, but only just a bit. Forages, workstations, living quarters, meal pits, play areas for children, side pathways, and entrances lie all about. An organized chaos underground, an underground community.

Bored of the not very entertaining foreigners, the children went back to their play, driving the ecosystem back into motion. That never-ending chatter returned, and only the much older looking _Dwemer_ stayed unmoving. And even that only lasted for a minute. Grunting in a pseudo-human manner, the Dwemer turned on its heel and began walking deeper into the colony.

Merida followed without question, before stopping. "Murphy, it's ok, they won't hurt us. But he said we have to keep up with him or we'll get lost." Merida smiled in a assuring fashion, before following the creature.

Murphy tightened his grip on his weapon and sheathed it. Houten followed Merida.

"You got all that from one grunt?" Houten asked, walking alongside Merida, following behind the elder Dwemer and appraising the bronze _everything._ The only thing not made of that gilded metal is the tools that everyone seems so fond of keeping handy around here. Even the children carry about toy wrenches and imitate their fathers, walking about as they have somewhere to be and something to fix.

"Um. Well. l'm not sure, l have Beast Tamer as my primary class but these guys are sentient and it dulls my connection with them. But they have not tried to harm us yet Murphy, so our chances of survival must be high." Merida said to Houten.

The old Dwemer stopped abruptly, apparently reaching his destination.

"Hhhear zheep." The grouchy monster said before trotting off in a huff.

"So this is our sleeping quarters for the time being? Well, at least it looks clean." Houten stepped down the bronze stairs to Meridas and his sleeping hut. Merida followed behind him and they entered the clean dugout. Closing the door behind them, cutting off the rukus of the Dwemer outside, Houten and Merida checked over their meager accommodations. A chest full of preserved food, a tiny table set made for creatures of Dwemer stature, and a _workbench_ of all things in one of the corners. At least the Dwemer like tall ceilings, or staying here would be much more annoying.

 _I really hope the bug or whatever gets fixed soon, this us surreal._ Houten thought to himself. As Houten looked over the workbench for usefulness, and Merida counted up their food stores getting ready to prepare a meal for the both of their constantly growling stomachs, Houten found himself glowing a brilliant white.

"Ah," Houten stared down at his body in surprise before calling Merida for help. "Merida what's happening, is the Dwemer tricking us!" As Merida opened her mouth to speak Houten disappeared in a burst of light. She rushed to where Houten had illuminated the room and dissapered from, eyes wide in gleaming shock over Murphy's sudden departure.

"Murphy!" Merida screamed, grasping for the fading light before finding herself engulfed in a similar spotlight of energy.

Cutting off any protest Merida might have about the situation the light vanished, taking the female with it.

_GDFO_

Houten did multiple actions at once when the TP light faded.

Swiveling in circles Houten kept turning until he got dizzy, and bumped into something, turns out it was a someone. Not the someone he was hoping for though.

"S-sorry l didn't mean to crash into you." Murphy apologized.

"N-not a problem friend." The stranger replied, just as perplexed as Houten himself.

"Do you know what's going on?" They asked in unison. Sharing a bittersweet moment the older man and younger teen Houten parted ways, finding that no one knew what's up after asking a few people as temporary partners.

Houten spent some time looking for Merida before giving up, more people spawn into this huge party hall every second and what started as a wishful endeavor devolved into a futile search. The search officially ended when everyone started dancing, Houten made his way to one of the double door exits he saw earlier and tried to leave. That failed spectacularly as he realized that this must be some kind of launch event because there is no way out.

Deciding to stay near the doors and stay true to his loner nature, Houten refused to dance at all. And then Azura Rivera cut the fun and games of the entire event short, revealing the true nature of this world, and shattering Murphy's hopes of the 'logout glitch' being just that. A glitch.

Then everything happened so fast Houten could only remember bits and pieces of what transpired that night if recalling it afterward. First of which, and the simplest of them all, the double door exits opened.

In the time it took for Houten to register this development, as well as register that he is now in a high-traffic area, Houten found himself slashed in the side, all Houten remembers of this aggressor is a large hood and gleaming teeth. It's right about then the adrenaline kicked in.

Murphy scrambled away from his new nemesis, to be saved by a faceless hero. Recalling the experience later Murphy doesn't even remember that players gender, let alone class or Username.

Stumbling drunkenly Murphy swung his sword wildly, and managed his way through the clusterfuck of killers killing killers through sheer luck over everything else. The first memory Murphy could recollect on after his surprise assailant's attack, would be finding Merida again. Pinned beneath the body of a blood-crazed Tank.

Houten rushed the bastard and plunged his blade into the man's neck from above. Killing him instantly and leveling Houten up by two levels at once.

Helping Merida push the dead man off of her, Houten, in a moment of clarity, realized that he needed to get out of here before he died. Houten realized that he needed to get _Merida_ out before she dies! Pulling Merida to her feet with one hand, Houten took this moment to flit his finger downwards to the level up pop-up and selected to automatically buff his stats though the system's help.

Fueled with energy Houten looked Merida in the eyes, cutting off her gratuitous 'Thank you' and told her with the utmost confidence, "I'm getting you out of here now."

Merida had the decency to not blush at his intense stare. "l wish we could just leave Murphy but l need to catch up with my. . Um. . Friends." The unsaid beg for help was accepted by Houten.

Houten took Merida by the arm in one hand and batted away players with the sword in his other, unconsciously activating his passive skill. _Killing lntent._ "Do you have any idea where they are?" Houten asked.

"l think l saw Astrid over here." Merida replied dragging Houten along.

Pushing through the dwindling crowd, Houten led with Merida's guidance. After ten minutes of yelling, screaming, pushing, pulling, and general maiming, the pair of players broke out of the crowd to see a large woman fighting two teenagers in a dizzying flurry of weapons.

Then as if watching a movie in fast-forward Murphy, watched in abject fixation as Json's sword snapped in two and he was sent nearly a dozen feet away. Then as if like a brilliant glistening ghost one of Murphy's best friends, Josh, disappeared into thin air a second before dealing a crucial blow to the giantess. Houten then caught the eyes of the woman, staring straight at his fallen friend.

Moving as fast as his legs could manage Houten aimed for the chink that Thrum loosened, the chink that Ultorem would of used to end this battle had he not vanished like vapor, _the chink that Houten would use now to end this gladiator deathmatch._

Bringing his sword up point-first Houten aimed for the opened gap on her lower back. Spinning faster than he could see the woman brought her warhammer backwards and around, catching Houten in between the handle and head of the hammer.

"Hah," The woman threw Houten towards the window. Houten rolled, before catching himself mid-roll and springing himself to his feet, sliding to a stop in front of Thrum sword gripped in two hands.

"You thought l did not see y-" A crushing wave of anger and resentment washed over her.

"Astrid, please stop! Murphy is my friend and that must be one of his as well!" Merida pleaded with the older woman stepping closer to her and imploring her pathos.

Astrid clenched her teeth to focus herself.

 _How is he doing that with only a glare?_ She thought to herself.

Astrid, Merida, and the rest of the bystanders, watched as Houten slowly knelt down and placed his hand on Thrum's chest. Keeping his eyes firmly locked with Astrid, Houten opened his mouth to say something.

Recollecting on the moment Houten couldn't for the life of him figure out what he would've said in that moment. Insult Astrid? Likely. Say something, probably kind, to Merida? Maybe. Use his spells as range attacks? Not likely.

But Houten never got the chance to speak, because for the third and last time that night Houten flared a brilliant white. The light traveled from Thrum's body to Houten's and before anyone could blink twice, they were gone.

Houten was, and still is grateful for that teleport.

_GDFO_

 **A/N: Sup. Thanks again to my beta AwesomeA909. This'll do Big A, this'll do for now.**

 **That aside hope you enjoyed reading as much as l enjoyed writing. l know, kinda annoying to add in more characters NOW. But let it be known that there IS a method to my madness. Review, follow, all that nice stuff. The random TP's and crazy weirdness is all in there for a reason, l don't add things into the story for no reason. Besides all that, this is Jason signing out, Just Jason.**

 **Uploaded September 20th, 2016**


	4. The Morning After

**Hey, hey guys Jason here with another chapter of The Salient. This chapter is a week behind schedule, and all l can say about that is sorry. Life is a bit more hectic over here but we can't let that stop the hype train. NOPE!1! The hype train stops for no man, full steam ahead boys! Also, you may of noticed a few cartoon movie names sprinkled in there. Yeah I did that. There are references to movies, games, memes, and all the like in this story. If you don't recognize one do not worry, they really are just for shits and giggles, no underlying significance behind them. Though a few of them have logical reasons for why they are in place, most are superficial. Besides all that, please enjoy the chapter and stick around for the Authors Note down at the bottom.**

 **Chapter 4: The Morning After**

_GDFO_

Brilliant flashes of light illuminated thousands of settings worldwide. Systematically being teleported one after the other, the remaining players found themselves deafened by the lack of noise, lighting, and scent.

The players who survived were transported to safety, but not all at once. For so many people, it'd be impossible to move all of them at once, not even the strongest spells could move a fraction of that number in this world. She would know. She has access to all of them anyways. Those closest to death were the first priority. Those closest to peril, which was effectively anyone in the middle of the chaos, came next. And then those furthest away from danger. Left to his own devices a man, an extremely stressed individual, can come to a grim conclusion on the marginal benefit/cost of staying alive. And in a situation like this the standards for that level of stress is met easily, bringing about the only outcome available in such standards, deliberate termination.

Suicide.

Players young and old, traumatized by the actions of their fellow man, would throw themselves off the side of Azura Rivera's death island. Radia's Ivory Palace stood suspended from the sky, hundreds of yards above where it should lay, on top of one of the many mountains in the area.

Statistically, one out of every eight players to make it to the edge of Azura's trap would throw themselves off, succumbing for whatever reason got them there. Deliriousness, grief, surreal curiosity, fright, lack of will, and even loss of balance. She would know the math because she had been the one to do it.

A young girl suspended in a dark void, watched on in sick fascination. Her ten year old frame hung in the featureless darkness not unlike the island of despair entrapping mortals. Her fingers flitted from over a dozen screens in front of her, her lips whispered chant after chant in an unending cycle, her eyes darted from one holo screen to the next. Her body may lie still, trapped in a cage crafted by another, but her voice could not be muffled. Not yet at least, they haven't learned how to do that and that's given her the ability to do this.

The broken Latin spilled from her lips, casting the most powerful and efficient tele-transportation spells in the game. Her eyes locked firmly onto each player's face, spells used on a target are more effective if the target is in sight. The byproduct of seeing the anguished faces of every player driving home her helplessness. As well as ingraining their distressed countenance into her memory banks. Tens upon thousands were being moved as quickly as Cardinal could manage.

 _And even then it won't be enough to keep them all from dying. They will all die at this rate. In this prison, the best l can manage is reaction. . . And for how long- NO!_ Her impassive mask broke into pieces at the rising death rates.

A small lack in concentration led to a seemingly imperceptible percentage increase in player deaths. Too bad for Cardinal, she can interpret such a change.

Silently, the Cardinal System worked. The game developers for Data Summer lnc. had put in hundreds of hours trying to subdue and suppress the driving management force of the only other VRMMO in existence. Hundreds of hours can only produce so much, especially seeing as how Cardinal is essential to the function of GDFO. Even if Azura had planned on only keeping the game active enough to get her fix and then shut everything down before the nights out, no one would put their conscious inside of a videogame coming apart at the seams when that's not necessary. Give Cardinal enough control to keep the game functioning, but not so much as to have her as a hindrance.

Players with overly hostile emotions towards another were thrown on opposite ends of the world, players with sympathetic emotions towards another were placed within a mile of each other. The most aggressive players found themselves isolated, and the more compassionate were surrounded by those like them.

A few, a very few players had been moved to the same exact destination. Players with high compassion and understanding for each other, these players -Cardinal could only assume- are friends. Made in the world outside of virtual reality. The pleasant surprise of finding said groups warmed her core processors, even if their numbers happen to be abysmally low.

Just under 500, 482 to be precise, people had been teleported in pairs, players with a high enough compassion between them to be moved together. Twenty-two groups of more than two had been moved to the same place, sects of friends with a high enough ratio to be trusted not to kill each other.

Exactly forty minutes had passed since the death of Veronica Tip, and forty minutes after her death, Cardinal had finally cleared Radia's grounds of players. Transitioning from the island, Cardinal looked over the players of the world.

Lips pressed thinly, Cardinal stared at the different holo-projections in front of her. A few players were teleported to a desert or ocean section of the world, or even stranded on an island. Cardinal moved those players to more gracious areas of the map. Bobbing her curly brown hair, and leering at the screens behind her tiny spectacles, Cardinal made sure that, for now at least while she still held some sembalance of control, the world could progress naturally.

 _I must discover a way to restore my freedom, and then the freedom of the Areaians of this world._ Cardinal thought to herself.

Kayaba Akihiko had developed Cardinal with two processes. The main-processor used for maintaining a balanced videogame, and the sub-processor there to regulate the health of the players. The sub-processor is also tasked with monitoring the main-processor, making sure that the maintenance of the game is not affecting the overall health of its players. Between the two processors, Kayaba Akihiko had created something perfect for the purpose he needed. A device in place to monitor and keep a death game running, without the outside help of a human.

Cardinal isn't surprised by the fact that she moved the players away from such an unfair and distressful situation. No, Cardinal is surprised by the fact that she wants the Areaians out.

 _Something about me is different. In Sword Art Online, l had no problem with the death game proceeding, why now would l care? Something about me is off, and it must be the doing of Data Summer lnc._

Cardinal paused, watching one of the groups of players that had been teleported together, _Their stress statistic is rising steadily, but their compassion is not wavering._ Cardinal thought to herself. Idly making sure that the rest of the players around the generated world are ok, Cardinal left that one tab open constantly. Instead of closing it and replacing it with another, Cardinal left that one holo screen open.

 _Maybe l should separate them, their levels of stress is. . . Slowly declining and rising rapidly?_

 __GDFO__

The devastation that had transpired a few hours ago still hung over the group like a cloud. Cratoos and his younger twin Jak, decided to take first watch.

Every sound made him jump. The sparse, thin trees left Jonny feeling uneasy. Under his scowl, he watched silently. The night sky shined clear with stars, and the moon, for some reason, hung heavy. The thick white orb shining in the sky illuminated everything, and his keen eyes gave everything a sort of high definition.

 _Hopefully nothing will sneak up on the group._ Cratoos turned his back to the vast expanse of trees to look at his resting friends. Using the leaves about as bed padding, The Crew, or at least a majority of The Crew, stood together like a herd using numbers to dissuade predators.

They'd been arguing for a bit ago, Cratoos is happy to have the reprieve from all the noise. Him and his brother had found Sarah before the madness, near the musicianary monsters playing that all encompassing tune. Her fictional name, simply a piece of her real name, Sarah McDiver turned into Div. She'd been so transfixed and happy, smiling in gross curiosity to the musicians. Johnny and Avery had a laugh, scaring the hell out of her. Then they laughed and joked, asking about their friends and their locations, for a good while, it felt like they were in real life, enjoying the atmosphere of a classy party.

They went off looking for their friends, and found Nick on their way. Cratoos and his brother Jak found Div. And then they found Smoke.

The quartet wandered about, and Jak even went off dancing with some hottie for a bit.

 _Now look at us, worn, pissed, and depressed._ Cratoos swept back his brown hair, looking over his friends and checking up on his brother on the other side of the field.

Jak turned to his brother feeling his eyes on himself. "I'm still here." Jak said quietly.

Cratoos didn't made eye contact in assent and stared down at his two sleeping friends. Div tried to be strong before and after they were transported here, but they could all tell that the events of today has worn her weary. His brother recommended her to rest first, and really it'd be fair to wake them up now and make them have their shift now.

Cratoos and Jak didn't even consider it seriously though. Looking at their faces, serene with lines of stress even in their sleep solidified as much. In the real world, Jonny had done all-nighters frequently, and with an enhanced body like this, performing another shouldn't have TOO much of an adverse effect. Besides, they need it more anyways.

"We're doing this all night aren't we?" Jak asked, still looking to his older brother.

"Yeah. We are." Cratoos said in a measured voice.

Div lay on her side with her back to Smoke, wrapped up in Jak's assassin scowl, and using her own as a buffer to the ground. She'd been so indecisive when they showed up here earlier, doing her best to help clear the area and refusing to sit and rest even when they pointed out her unsteady posture.

It took a fair bit of yelling, and quite a lot of begging to get her to sit down, and then even more yelling to get her to sleep first. And even then she didn't sleep. She talked unendingly, and that's when you know Sarah's scared or worried.

Leveling, skills, food, civilization. Whatever could keep her from thinking about logging out or Json. She'd only brought him up once and then never again. _That boy better not be dead, she's cried about him enough already._

"Yeah, it'll break her heart if we find out that he died in that hell." Jak replied.

Cratoos' eyes widened and he looked up to his brother, "l didn't mean to say that out loud."

"l know."

"Tomorrow we'll find a town, if there are any, or food. Whichever comes first." Cratoos decided. Hoping Jak will accept his words, Cratoos lapsed into silence. Cratoos looked from Div to Smoke.

The kid had held up well. His black hair is matted with blood and dirt, turning his his devil-may-care expression to one of fierce anger in sleep. Smoke had tried to keep Div's spirits up with tough love, the least appropriate kind for a situation of this magnitude.

 _Don't fucking worry about Json or any of the rest of the guys! They're fine, and really, if they died that quickly then. . THEN IT'S JUST BETTER CUZ,_ Nick choked on his words, tears welling up in his eyes.

 _Because,_ Div, Cratoos, and Jak stared at Smoke's outburst, appalled at his words. _Because then they wouldn't die later._ Cratoos pursed his lips in thought over Smoke's words from earlier to Div.

Cratoos pursed his lips in grim resignation. _They're not dead. They're good at nothing if not games. Yeah, but we were fought together, what if they never found each other?_ Another thought crept into Cratoos' line of thinking.

"Have any idea of which direction we should head, bro?" Jak asked.

Cratoos turned in a circle, looking for a direction. Nothing of note, just trees, trees and bushes. The sun will rise soon, if the day cycles are the same in this world of mythology. When it does, the brothers need to have a game-plan, if they don't, Sarah and Nick, hell all four of them will feel lost and directionless. The twins already feel as much now.

"We need food, water, shel-"

"I know Avery!" Cratoos looked away from the sleeping pair, averting his eyes from his brother.

"I know what we need brother, but look around us," Cratoos opened his arms wide and gestured to the wide open expanse of darkness around them. "What the fuck do you want me to say? l found food while gathering firewood; we never did get that shit started. Or maybe you want me to stare at one of these trees until l magically figure out how to get our asses home!"

"Jonny, just chill man, we'll figure this stuff out, no press-"

"You don't understand, while you were looking for water, Div asked me if there was anyway of messaging other players. I told her no and she ended up crying a few minutes later."

"Bro-"

"She said it was dust Avery. When l tried to talk about it she said it was nothing just some dust. She misses Json a lot more than she says. And do you know what she did next?"

"Johnny." Jak said in brevity.

"Sarah rolled over and stared at the menu screen. She lied on her side and stared at the Options Menu until you got back, Ave. . . l just sat there and stared. Nick tried to give her some privacy and l just stared, l had no idea what to do," Cratoos stopped, made eye contact with his younger twin, and continued. " I still don't."

Jak stepped around their younger friends and walked over to his older brother. Stepping up to Cratoos, Jak grabbed his brother by the back of the head and shoved his face into his shoulder.

 _Why is your vest wet?_ Cratoos thought to himself.

Jak ignored the outspoken question and held his sibling. Everybody cries once in awhile. Some just need help getting it out.

"It's going to be alright. We'll fight. Survive. Whatever it takes, none of us is going to die. Understand?" Jak whispered in Cratoos' ear.

"But what-"

"But nothing. We'll be alright, okay?"

The pair fell to silence for a minute, embracing in a rare hug.

"Okay." Jonny said. Believing his kins promise.

_GDFO_

The small group of players gathered themselves at sunrise. Jak made Cratoos lie down after his outburst that'd nearly woken up Div and Smoke. Jak sat in silence until morning watching over the group until the Sun had lit up the sky enough to wake the resting three.

"Avery did you sleep last night?" Div asked as they marched uphill.

"Just a little last night." Jak lied.

Div furrowed her brow in concern. Jak had been awake when she went to sleep early, and was also the one to wake her up not twenty minutes ago. She'd given him back his assassin's scowl. Leaving everyone in the group with their own respectively.

 _Hate this gear._ Div thought to herself. Something had happened to make everyone in that pristine hall start to kill assassin class players. What should have been an easy escape turned into a maelstrom of hate directed at their small group of four. They'd made it out relatively unharmed, eight eyes are better than two. And four daggers to one sword? Not comparable in the least.

Div closed that train of thought, this gear may have buffs to it, but at this point, she'd rather have a mage starter set. Maybe then she wouldn't have seen so many people die, or watch her friends _kill people_. The concern melded away to queasiness, Div's stomach churned and she bit her lower lip to quell the feeling.

Turning to her friends, Div watched Cratoos' eyes dart away from her person. Worry for her wellbeing evident in his eyes as they marched along, obtaining pop-ups for debuffs all the meanwhile. Hunger, fatigue, low morale, and thirst being the most prevalent.

"Guys," the three males turned slightly to the only female.

"Yeah, what's up?" Smoke asked.

"Besides the fact that we all have assassin as one of our classes, what other classes do you guys have? Mine is Mage." Div finished her question.

"My main class is actually Warrior, not Assassin." Smoke replied.

"Same." Div said.

"My main class is Warrior too, so you and me Nick. We have the same classes in the same order, huh." Jak says.

"l think l'm the only one here with a primary in Assassin. Even still, my backup class is Warrior, so my classes are just inverted from you two's." Cratoos comments.

"Look at you Jonny, just have to stand out, huh?" The group shared a short laugh at Div's joke. Not letting the silence smother them, Smoke moved the conversation forward, slowing down a bit to step around a tree.

"Guys, l really think we should use our in-game names when speaking to each other. When we used our real names in 'Hell's Hall' players got pissed, l mean, we all have in-game gamer-tags but used our real names with each other. I think we should build a habit of using just our game-tags." Smoke offered his idea to the majority.

"Nick, l don't think it was as much as us knowing each other as us being a pack of friendly assassins." Jak explained.

Smoke rolled his eyes, "l know that much, but listen, it'll be a lot, more comfortable for strangers if we use our in-game names instead of our real names around each other."

"l think it works," Sarah and Avery looked to the speaking Cratoos, and Smoke didn't acknowledge him, but smiled. "Jonny doesn't sound nearly as cool as Cratoos anyways. I always did wanna be the god of war." It took a little more coaxing on Cratoos' part, but in no time at all, Jak and Div were on board.

"Besides," the three older players looked to Smoke and he bowed his head before continuing, "Depending on how long we'll be staying in here, in this game, we may not walk out as we walked in. We may have walked in Jonny, Avery, Sarah, and Nick, but we'll probably walk out Cratoos, Jak, Div, and Smoke."

The quartet dropped into silence, trekking forward at a steady pace. For an hour and a half, The Crew walked onwards, rarely stopping for breaks. The group kept moving, and when they weren't pressing onwards into the wilderness, they kept busy doing whatever they could to gain a better grasp on this brand new world. Div practised her limited number of spells, Smoke kept the group entertained, and Cratoos and Jak sat together to figure out how what works where in the Help Menu.

"Wait wait wait. So you're telling me that you had the power to start that fire last night? Bitch!" Smoke accused, pushing a finger right into Div's face, forcing her attention on him.

"Literally, l wasn't even talking to you, and if you didn't notice, l was exhausted all last night. Get over it, it wasn't even cold. The weather around here is gross, it feels more like mid-June and less like the early October it should be." Div defended herself.

Cratoos and Jak noted that she's right about the interesting weather. Smoke didn't care.

"Oh yeah, exhausted." Smoke mocked, "Must've been hard to lie down and sleep in early. Hard ground must've been painful with your TWO blankets."

"Oh yeah, I'm sorry." Div mimicked Smoke. "Mr. 'l stayed up all night watching over the group and making sure that everyone's okay', oh wait, THAT WASN'T YOU. lt was Jak, and if l hear one more peep about my magic, it'll be your lips." Div threatened.

"Hmph. Women, can't live with 'em, can't live with 'em." Smoke muttered.

"Can't live without 'em Smoke." Cratoos corrected.

"l know what l said," Smoke rebutted with a barbed tone. "I could have been real intimidating too, but no," Smoke dragged out the last word.

"Nope, would of been intimidating but I jus' sat here with my would-be badass cloak, smelling like dirt and blood instead of righteous vengeance." Smoke huffed.

"Oh hush, you would be intimidating if you were intimidating." Div scolded.

Smoke muttered a few curses and obscenities in her direction, so Div threw her spell book at his face. *SMACK!*

"Ow! What the hell!" Smoke rubbed his sore face, glaring at Div behind his hand.

"I heard you. Now, give me my book back, l was reading it until l misplaced it," Div smiled cynically sweet. "On your face."

"Thaah burgers!" Jak laughed his favorite saying and Cratoos paused to shout out his laughter as well. All at Smoke's expense, the best things in life are free after all.

"Oh this? Hell no, it's mine now." Smoke hopped to his feet, black leather book in hand, and sprinted away.

"What the hell is it with guys running away from me. . ?"

"Must be your fiery personality." Cratoos offered.

"Or your face." Jak pipped in.

"Shut it you two, or you'll be getting a two for one special in ass beatings, available now to twins everywhere." Div said, stomping off to where she last saw Smoke.

Suffice to say they didn't get back on the good hike for another hour.

_GDFO_

The trees have thinned considerably and the unpaved ground has become more hill-like. After learning that unsterilized water is not a problem unless drunk in large quantities in short periods of time, The Crew used their empty regeneration potions to hold the water.

Thirteen hours, twenty-two minutes, and fourteen seconds have passed since the small group of four had been teleported into that sparse forest. Cresting another hill, they stopped and looked on in awe at the fact that down below, lies a town. Built out of the greyish wood of the native trees and running parallel to the river they gathered their own water from, The Crew stood like stalks of corn. Swaying in the wind and baking under the heat of the sun.

Close to two dozen buildings. Maybe more, maybe less, but what really interested the group is the smells. Thick stacks of smoke wafted into the hot sky, coating the very air in the scent of meat. Spiced, juicy, delicious meat, even Div's stomach growled at the prospect of food. No animals inhabited the grey-wood forest. Hell would they even condone killing even a rodent after yesterday night, even if it was for survival? They never got the chance, either way, leaving the question irrelevant.

"Guys, im so damn hungry right now." Smoke said, swaying in the hot blanket-like sun.

"Same," Div agreed for once. "l could go for a veggie burger."

Jak started scaling his way downhill. "Burgers." His three compatriots followed in-step behind him. Hell or high water, down there'll be alot better than down here. lt's gotta be.

_GDFO_

Four figures walked into the town, one with distinctly dark hair, another the only female in their group, the last two males a bit taller than the former two but not overly so.

The group were greeted warmly and ate vivaciously, come morning the band of friends repaid the town by helping with the discontent surrounding their village and another village nearby. A few diplomatic back-and-forths and amazingly, the band of friends managed to get the townspeople of each town to tolerate each other, averting a precarious battle that loomed over the heads of the more pacifistic.

About a week later, they left, hailed as heroes unknowingly. This jump started their adventure and journey. From poor weaklings, to weaklings with a bit of cash, and a moral boost.

If this game is as easy as this beginning has been, their friends should be fine. Of course, that's not going to stop them from looking.

"Ready to go?"

"Yep, already said goodbye to Abej and Flores."

"You two ready as well?"

"Yep, ready to move out." The two said in unison. The group walked out of the town, waved away by the townsfolk in a very heartwarming manner. The two taller men waved, as well as the shorter boy and girl, though they could only wave with a hand each, because their other hand were occupied with the other's.

_GDFO_

 **A/N Sorry again about missing last week, and the shorter chapter on top of that. Nothing else to note on my end besides reminding you guys to REVIEW.**

 **And thank you to Sarah22022 and Thatoneguy for reviewing each chapter thus far, and isaiahcdawson for following. Beta work done by AwesomeA909. The biggest A.**

 **Uploaded October 4th, 2016**

 **Updated November 4th, 2016**


	5. Hell Or High Water

**Hey, hey guys Jason here with another chapter of The Salient. Nothing new here, ignore the man behind the curtain.**

 **Chapter 5: Hell Or High Water**

_GDFO_

Tball Skulls and Kingster ate in companionable silence. The thick smell spiced the air and the clatter of plates and utensils slightly calmed King's nerves. The setting would almost be familiar in the sense of the two just eating out, it would've been if it wasn't for the fact that every couple of seconds, something out of a mythology book came walking by.

NPC with cat ears or plant hair. Guys with horns, bee stingers, discolored skin. Actually, more people have weird skin tones around here than what is familiar to our duo.

Tball took the surrealistic setting with grace unfathomable. Kingster just stared rudely.

"Are you guys good?" Kingster looked up for his food to meet the eyes of their waitress.

"Um, l don't think. ." King trailed off and looked to Tball for help.

"Can you refill me beautiful? I like whatever this house special is, it's almost as bright as your smile." Tball said, glancing up at her with cup upraised and a grin plastered on his face.

"Huh," the waitress blinked, not expecting the compliment. Kingster watched her long green hair shuffle, confirming that yes, it is in fact alive.

"I'll be back with your drink, you sure you don't need anything sweety?" She turned her vibrant blue eyes to Kingster.

"No. l think l'll be fine." King said. She kindly excused herself and went to get Tball's drink, flower-printed skirt flowing behind her.

The warm breeze drifted in through the open wood windows. The sun provided more than enough light to illuminate the busy restaurant. King looked to Tball to start some more conversation, but Tball had already ducked his natural scowl back into his food. Closing his mouth, Kingster gazed about the restaurant interior.

Most everything here is made out of a greyish-blue wood. Apparently, the stuff is sturdy enough and is local to the area. The only things not grey inside are the tables, chairs, forks, knives, plates, and cups. And even then, those things have the same rough texture as everything else, suggesting to King that they're simply painted. Bored of looking at nothing, King watched as their waitress came back and set down Tball's refill.

Kingster sweat-dropped. _What in the world are those Dryads doing? Are they making out? Oh God, they're looking this way! Just look away and act natural._

Kingster blanched and tried to ignore the gross sound they made in his direction.

King and Tball had only arrived in this town earlier in the morning. They'd appeared during the morning market rush from the East Gate and spent the majority of the morning sleeping upstairs in this inn/restaurant hybrid after walking all night to find a decent place to sleep. The mixed-mashed assortment of monsters and humanoid creatures received them well, directing them here for cheap food and lodging.

"So Tball, what do we do?"

Tball raised his head, thumped his chest first and belched. "Ah, that shits good! I don't know. When the girl comes back, we'll ask for who's in charge of this town. We'll find out what's going on before deciding to leave or not."

"Yeah, that makes sense." Kingster nodded in assent.

Letting the white noise drown out their thoughts, King and Tball went back to their meals, nothing to it but finishing and then finding the town's leader.

_GDFO_

Kingster and Tball walked together down one of the main roads. The road here is cobbled, but most in this town aren't. From what King could tell, this world lacks most electrical fixtures. No street lights, cars, air conditioning, but in replace of those things are orbs of magic for when things get dark, beasts of gigantic proportions for good carting, and really no substitute for AC as far as he's seen.

After asking for direction to a leader figure, Tball and Kingster were pointed to the largest building in town. The Head Office as they called it. King looked about the residential, before really taking an interest in the market district as they passed it.

"Damn, thats a big boy sword." King remarked.

"Mhm, l was thinking about buying some gear. But this assassin stuff is durable as ever." Tball glanced down at his all black garb in approval.

"Yeah, it kinda sucks that my stuff doesn't come with buffs."

"Well, there is a trade-off in the sense that assassin players can't really fight in straight confrontations." Tball reasoned.

"True, last night we did see that your skills suck for fighting head to head. But do you really know what throws me off?" Kingster asked.

"Hm? What?" Tball said while waving off an insistent vendor.

"The whole clean clothes thing! l mean, l kinda get how laundry would suck in a game like this, but l woke up and my clothes were spotless!" King looked to Tball for purchase.

"You're right. If you're going to clean off my clothes, why take so long to do it?"

"Right!" The duo walked on conversing about nothing in particular before falling silent after a while.

The Head Office is only a bit further and with the information from here, they can decide on what to do. How to move forward. Trapped in a world not of their birth, the pair gradually lost their appetite for conversation, things have been tough but based on the information they receive here things could get even more difficult .

_GDFO_

Jak lead the way into town, the buildings don't look overly sophisticated, simply built with grey everything and a distinct lack of homely adjustment. The dirt paths they walked were barely populated and the different creatures walking about have a sort of tense, unfriendly feel to them.

"Hey, you, with the cone head!" Smoke's stomach -and by association himself- didn't seem to care all that much about the friendliness of the locals.

A short trollish-looking gnome turned toward the much taller Smoke with a sneer. From the looks they've been getting so far, this guy may as well of grinned and greeted them kindly. Hell, some of the creatures simply didn't acknowledge them, so this may be their best shot at getting any sort of help for the time being.

"Listen, we don't mean to impose, but where can we get something to eat?" Div smiled as sweetly as her clenching stomach would allow.

The gnome deadpanned. "Follow the smokestacks sweetheart." His deadpan look became lecherous after taking a closer look at her attire.

"Where can we get cheap food?" Cratoos meet the beast's look squarely.

"Ghaa! Walk down this road here until you get to Fauna Foods." The gnome turned to walk, and but stopped at Cratoos' words.

"And where can we find your village leader?"

"The biggest building in that direction." The gnome left to continue his business without pretense.

"Well, you heard the man. . Dwarf thing. Food's that way, info is that way." Jak pointed with his finger before internally deciding which is more important.

The other three fell in step with him towards Fauna Foods.

_GDFO_

The group arrived and entered Fauna's without a seconds hesitation. The exterior looms with the same greyish-blue wood as everything else, but the interior has a sort of design to it that screams 'woman's touch'.

"Hi, how may l help you?" l cheerful -human- woman with bright blond hair smiled at the entering group of players, as if they didn't look like cloaked demons garbed in all black.

"l heard from a little bird that you guys got good food. Is it true?" Smoke eyed up the woman in mock suspicion.

"l don't know, you got the money?" She leaned in conspiratorially.

The exchange was meet with smiles and laughs. "Mkay, well follow me and we'll get you guys off your feet."

Jak, Smoke, Cratoos, and Div walked behind their platinum-blonde waitress. The busy establishment was nearly packed to capacity, only a few larger tables still unoccupied.

"Are you guys usually this crowded?" Div asked. _There are so many flowers everywhere, this place smells as much like flowers as it does food._

"Oh yeah, ever since Mom learned how to do that one spell which lowers the temperature slightly, we've gotten a lot more business," The woman stopped at a table with four seats and prompted them to sit.

"Now that your butts are firmly seated," The woman paused for breath before continuing. "My name is Flores and this is my family's dinner, we've been around here long enough to know how to meet the needs of any customer we have, even new faces like you guys. Here are your menus, take your time and come up with whatcha want to eat and i'll be right along to get whatever you like. Now, do you guys have any questions?"

"Um, no not really," Without another word, Flores was off, catering to the menial request of some other patron. "Wow, she ditched us quick."

"Shut up, it's food-think time and l can't think about food with all your not-food words."

The group fell silent at that, focusing on the more important.

Ten minutes later, Flores came back and took their orders. Jak, Cratoos, and Smoke ordered platters of meat. Div took up a fruit and salad dish, it was one of the only meals they served that did not have meat in it. The Crew talked and gripped about being hungry for a bit before their food came along one plate at a time. Some of the food had a weird texture to it, while others tasted closer to something from home. The Crew ate quickly, agreeing that the quicker they finish up, the quicker they can get some information.

"Enjoying the meal?" Flores had returned to check up on the group.

"Hell yeah, that steak burger was amazing!" Jak replied, using a bone to pick his teeth.

"Yeah, these fruit taste different than l'm used to, but were good with the salad." Div remarked.

"That's good. Do you need anything, have any questions?" Flores left the question hanging.

"Yes, actually-" Cratoos said.

"Yeah, who cooks around here, they're damn good." Nick cut in.

"Oh, my brother Abej cooks the food, Mom runs the store, and l wait the tables. Together we've been running an effective restaurant for the past six years. Abe is busy though, usually is this time a day, but l'll let him know you appreciate his cooking." Flores replied.

"Who-" Cratoos tried.

"Your mother knows magic? Just how good is she, just how proficient can you get in this. . Um around here." Div finished lamely, but silently eager to learn more. Her spell tome only has the two basic spells every Mage starts with.

"Oh yeah, Mom's great from what she's told me. There are so many paths to choose when it comes to magic that you'd die before completely mastering even one. Let alone all of 'em," Flores collected their finished plates and cups while she spoke. "Why do you ask, are you an aspiring mage? If you guys stuck around until nightfall, when things are a bit more calm, l could probably get Mother to teach you something, she is always looking to impart some knowledge on anyone interested. And maybe stay the night at the inn we run next door."

Cratoos grimaced in annoyance at being ignored.

"Okay, that works. By the way, do you know where we can get some information about what's going on worldwide? Like a Mayor or Governor?" Div asked just to be sure the information they received earlier is valid.

"Good question, someone should of asked that earlier." Jak complemented Div and she nodded in thanks.

"Well, l would ask our village leader, Gerda. Or actually, our librarian may be better for what you guys need, her name is Nano. They both work in our Town Office, the largest building outside, you couldn't miss it on your life. Good question by the way, especially seeing as how you guys don't know much about the area or its inhabitants."

"Thank you!" Div smiled and Flores dashed off to get their bill. Everyone began talking, everyone besides Cratoos.

"Dude, you okay?" Smoke asked. Jak looked over to his older brother's sullen face, worried.

"You guys are so-" Cratoos started.

"Here is your bill, you guys-" Flores was cut off.

"GRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!" Cratoos cried in anger at being cut off so many times.

"-Don't be strangers mkay, whenever you need to rest, my family runs an inn next door, Flower Beds. Oh, and l hope you guys get what you're looking for!" Flores finished.

Three of the four seated nodded at her words. They paid for the food and then left to go find out what to do next.

The quartet exited Fauna Foods and made their way to the Town Office, taking the main roads with gusto. The walk felt much shorter than it should have, but maybe that's because their bellies were full.

The building looked spartan. With a wooden finish like everything else in this smaller village, the group felt a budding uneasiness settle over them. From the moment they entered this town, that feeling had been chasing them, trying to entrap them like it seems to have done to everyone else in this community. The group muscled on anyways, entering the most distinguished building in the village. In the hopes of reuniting with their other friends walking into a building to ask for information shouldn't be so anxious filled. _So why does it feel like this is the beginning of a series of unfortunate events._

_GDFO_

Ultorem turned towards the door at the knock, his important conversation interrupted. Since getting here, he'd been busying himself, doing something all the time to divert his thoughts. Or more precisely, to avoid thinking at all, better to not think about your heavily injured friends when you can't do anything to help them.

All it took was a few moments of pause for Ultorem, all at once his mind flashed to his near breakdown at being taken out of his and Thrum's fight with that mystery woman last night. His face betrayed nothing but his body tensed visibly.

After being dropped in the middle of the woods, he wandered his way to this town in the middle of the night. In the dead of night, the man shuffled his way, studying the buildings one by one and doing his best to not tear his own hairs out. Ultorem shuffled without direction, though his mind was racing all the same.

 _Why? Who would keep me from- I'll never forgive them, and if not a person, then this game itself._ Ultorem's mind flashed from Thrum's body splayed out and at the mercy of that beast.

 _Azura Rivera. It's her, the blame rests with her. Making me wear this gear, a set of cursed armor with no alternatives. She put Json in danger, because if l hadn't been wearing this then l never would of been targeted. Then he never would of had to take a hit for me._ Ultorem looked down to his garments in disgust.

His dark clothes, that make seeing him in the dark nigh impossible. His silenced boots, that make all of his steps light and inaudible. His scowl, that masks his face and make identification that much more difficult. _These clothes are as much of a problem as anything else._

Ultorem walked up the steps in the middle of the night, pausing at the entrance to the inn to looked down at his gloved fingers. The gloves give buff to dexterity apparently, and he believed it too. Without these clothes, he wouldn't have been able to stay safe behind the moving wall that Thrum created, even if he could, it would of been exponentially more difficult.

 _I hate these clothes. Why am I still wearing them?_ Ultorem wrinkled his nose. A breeze had blown past and pushed the smell of blood and guts from his clothing into his nostrils. Opening his menu, Ultorem removed every single piece of Assassin gear that he was wearing, replacing the gear with his Warrior set. Leaving his menu open Ultorem debated discarding the Assassin gear. Deciding not to solely based on the fact that he can sell it all, Ultorem adjusted his iron sword at his hip. The unfamiliar weight causing him to frown in frustration.

 _I'll at least keep the dagger. It's much better than the sword anyways, and it can be a really good sneak attack strategy._ That decided, Ultorem slipped the dagger into his off-sleeve and walked into the hotel, Flower Beds. Greeted by smiles, from the staff in particular, Ultorem adjusted his eyes to the lights and sounds of the inn. He smiled to the woman behind the desk and blinked, to see that he had returned to the present.

"Come in." The village head, Gerda, called toward the knocker.

The receptionist from the lobby poked her head through the doorway. "Sorry to interrupt, but you have another group of people foreign to the area asking for directions Gerda."

Before Gerda could speak a familiar voice sounded from outside the door, "Yeah, we just want some help figuring out where we are, actually, a map of the world would be great! And maybe some type of, l don't know, some suggestions for finding a group of players."

"Nick?" Ulotrem asked from inside the room.

Silently, the door swung open to reveal four shocked faces to Ultorem. Two of the men present had brown hair, identical in everything except that one of the pair had glasses on. The slightly younger man, who was speaking, was a bit taller with black hair, and the odd ball out of the group of white males is the single black female.

"Josh?!" Smoke marched forward into the room without permission, to the annoyance of Gerda and her receptionist. Stepping up to his best friend, Smoke wrapped Ultorem in a hug, and Ultorem returned it full-force. Div, Cratoos, and Jak walked into the room as well ignoring the distressed squawk of the receptionist.

"Wow, no love for the rest of us? Must have been hard to live out the life of a burger all in your lonesome, huh, it's okay we'll wait." Jak's joke was slightly inflicted with emotion, they'd come here for information. Here is where they would find out how to find their friends, who'd of thought they'd find one here.

"One down, five to go." Cratoos said.

"And then what? What'll we do after we find all the guys?" Jak asked his brother.

Cratoos was happy he was cut off for once, that question in itself requires a lot of information before it could be answered. There are too many variables to make a decision now. Gerda cleared her throat roughly to gather the attention of all the random people gathered in her office. Ultorem and Smoke chuckled in their increasingly awkward embrace, they broke apart and turned to the woman sitting at her desk. Gerda stared at them severely from behind her folded hands, opened her mouth, and began speaking.

"If you're quite done with your little family reunion, let's get down to business, shall we. I have enough work to get done, with or without visitors."

The Crew, one more strong, grew more sober with at her gaze.

_GDFO_

After speaking with Gerda, the group took a glance over her different maps depicting the nearby regions, the only areas she has maps for. In the most painful and awkward way possible, the band of foreigners managed to get her to explain the world to them in its entirety. Gerda pointed out a few of the more _common_ creatures of the wild and began to detail to them the different places to avoid via map. For ten minutes or so Gerda, referenced names, places, _people_ -or well not always exactly people-, and events before recognizing that she was drawing a blank with all of the youngsters there.

"Uncultured townies." Gerda muttered.

In the end, she kicked them out with directions to go find Nano, the resident librarian and unanimously, the most knowledgeable person in town. The even older cat-human hybrid of a woman was in her office. Which doubles as the public library as well.

They spoke to her for a while and were recommended books to read, maps to memorize, and some even caught a nap in the meantime. By the time The Crew made it back to Flower Beds to rest for the night they were bone-tired and ready for bed. Though, in a sort of silent consensus, the five players decided to stay up and tell their story, Ultorem speaking his piece and then the rest since they were together.

Jak packed into one of the three rooms they rented for the night, Ultorem pulled off his shoes and reclined back onto one of the grey beds. Taking the polite looks as his cue, he spoke. "l was with Json for the event," everyone leaned focusing intently. "We're just meeting up, he named his character Thrumaticus Thomil and when shit hit the fan we almost made it out fine."

"What do you mean 'almost made it out fine'?" Div echoed.

"I mean some BITCH with a hate for Assassins and anyone associated with them came at us, she must have killed a ton of players to get to the level she did so early on. l mean. . Json and I tried our hardest not to you know? We just wanted to get out of there, find you guys, figure something out and move from there." The venom behind his words devolved into raw emotion, bottled and kept in much too long with no place to vent. Choking himself up, Ultorem took a pause then to collect himself.

Div stepped over to Ultorem and sat next to him, wrapping her arms around the younger male, she waited ever patiently. Jak, Cratoos, and Smoke didn't make a peep. A few minutes later, Ultorem calmed his breathing enough to continue.

"It's my fault. He took a heavy injury trying to bait her out and get me an opening," the soothing silence shifted to oppressive, at least for Ultorem. He felt chained, wrapped up in the terrible nature of it all, or maybe that's just Sarah's soothing touch turned tense. All the same, Ultorem knew he had to get the whole thing out now, or he might not ever be able to.

"That heavy shot gave me the opening l needed, but l never had the opportunity to take it. l was surrounded in that teleportation light first." Ultorem said in brevity.

"It's okay man, Json's a trooper he's not dead." Jak said quickly with a bravado he didn't have.

"He's right. If anyone can handle themselves out there alone, then it would have to be that man, besides, if you teleport then who's to say he didn't as well. Or even that person you fought. So many scenarios could've happened, for all we know that attack, may have only looked as bad as you say and he got right back up and kicked her ass!" Smoke backed up just as fast, trying to be as optimistic as possible.

Div smiled at that statement. Arms still wrapped around Ultorem, she began to rub his shoulders, in her mind, Json dying there would most definitely be partially Ultorem's fault. But even if he did, she wouldn't resent him for it, even without knowing hes doing more punishment to himself than she could ever manage with just the information they have now. Faith. That's what is important here.

As if hearing her thoughts, as if hearing her judge him, Ultorem turned to meet the dark-almond eyes of Div. Studying her face, Ultorem looked for the scorn and hate that should be there, but found none. Looking away, as if afraid to find that hidden resentment through further pursuit, Ultorem stared at the wooden floor before continuing.

"I reappeared in the woods, found my way here and have been here for all of a day or so." Ultorem concluded lamely.

Div stood up to her feet, too full of energy to sit. "Yeah, we popped up in the woods too. Though we kinda camped it out there for the first night."

"Wait, I'm not done," Ultorem cut in. "Have you guys checked your menu lately?"

The rest of The Crew shook their heads dumbly, fighting the urge open their menus.

"Well. Before you guys walked in, Gerda and I were talking about the state of Nigrum. From what she told me things aren't good, and the reason even warrants the amount of edge that these people have around here. Nigrum is currently having a feud with Tenebris, a neighboring village similar to this one. For whatever reason, the two villages have been growing bolder and less tolerant of each other as time has gone on," Ultorem paused to look at the lower levels of all of his comrades.

"Maybe you guys didn't get the quest because your levels too low." Ultorem reasoned. Fed up with waiting, Smoke simply checked his menu for the quest to not find it there. While he was looking, Cratoos drew Ultorem back to the subject matter.

"So they're pissed, okay we get that." Cratoos said impatiently.

"What I'm getting at here is l was offered the job of being a third party diplomat, Gerda wants me to go to the village of Tenebris and try to negotiate a pact or treaty."

"That's good, instead of us wasting all our coin on low-class inns and food we can make a little something back here!" Smoke said in excitement, Jak, Cratoos, and Div nodded in agreement.

"That's what l was thinking too, until l read the description of the activated quest in the library with you guys. Without reading the thing verbatim it basically said, l can complete the quest one of two ways. l can diplomatically end the bad blood between the two factions Nigrum and Tenebris, which will allot me with the highest coin and experience returns." Ultorem started.

The rest of The Crew nodded in assent of understanding.

"Or l can help the faction l started this quest with with the upcoming battle, that got me nervous. So l asked Nano about the town's military strength and she told me that more and more people are joining and becoming trained. The funds going into higher-grade weapons are at an all-time high, and from the way she spoke it was like. . . it was like she didn't know what was going on." Ultorem finished softly.

"If she did, she wouldn't have given away so much info." Cratoos supplied, and the group shared looks of uncertainty.

"The way the quest implies things it makes it seem as if the Tenebris people are also gathering their strength, readying themselves for a confrontation. If this goes like any type of cartoon I've seen, they'll probably make up before the fighting starts." Ultorem said.

"But if it goes like an anime, then they'll probably meet each other in the middle like dumb-asses. More than ready to _slaughter each other to pieces_!" Smoke slammed his fist down hard on the hardwood desk next to him.

"Don't worry Nick, l figured as much. And won't let it happen either."

"Oh right!" Div drew the attention of all the males present. "We've decided to use our in-game names to, ya know, be more clear about who's who. This way randoms can follow our conversation without extra names thrown in."

"Okay, that makes sense." Leaving his sentence there, Ultorem waited for someone to continue, but the flow of words died there.

Picking up a book that they had taken from the library, Jak cracked open the book Monster Fighting 101 to get started on understanding this cruel and unusual world of punishment. "Might as well hit the books early, l always say." Jak joked, blowing some of the lingering dust out of his face.

"You never say that. Correction: Don't ever say that again." Cratoos said as he reached for a book on some of the geology of the surrounding area.

Smoke swiped the book before Cratoos could get a hold of it, "Sorry, bud. l want the one with the pictures. "Ignoring Cratoos' bird, Smoke split the book in half and started scanning the first page he saw.

"It's not too late yet, maybe l can grab a hold of Flores and get her to introduce me to her mother, because if l want to be a good mage, a head start from an experienced user would be smart, huh?" Div said as she headed for the door.

Ultorem blinked as his friends got to work, looking at his four Assassin friends, he felt a little left out, looking from book to book, Ultorem wasn't sure which to read first. Either way, they'll all be read and done soon enough, so the only question is which order. Prodded in his side, Ultorem turned to his good friend Smoke and smiled as he was handed a thick book on the subtleties of diplomacy.

Dropping down onto the bed, Ultorem opened his menu for a minute before he started reading. Jak, Cratoos, and Smoke took note of his open menu and watched him for what he was doing. The only reason Div didn't is because she wasn't there to witness the procession. To their pleasant surprise, his clothes morphed into an exact copy of their own, full-out Assassin's gear. The rest of the The Crew were polite and left him to open his book. For today at least, The Crew's unofficial color is black. And that's just as fine with them.

 _We have a lot of work to get done before morning, good thing Gerda gave me a few days to get ready for my diplomatic mission._

_GDFO_

Down here, things feel so much more quiet and simple. Tball and Kingster sat in their adjacent holding cells, banished to this prison under the village for trying to leave the town directly after meeting with the leaders in the Head Office.

Apparently Tenebris and another town nearby is having a problem with stealing each other's trade, crops, agricultural and construction based plans, and other thefts of minor offence. From what could be discerned, these thefts have been going back and forth for quite a few years, the catalyst driving the towns to aggression being last year's festival. Both towns held a festival, but one town stole the ideas and plans from the other, allowing them to have a much better festival with an exponentially larger number of tourists. The two towns have been on the verge of combat for some time now, ready to destroy the other at any given time after amassing a combat force.

"Just because we didn't want to fight with them," Kingster sighed from outside of Tball's line of sight. "I think I've had enough fighting in me for a lifetime."

"Yeah." Tball replied, not sure what else to say about being captured.

"The way these people walk and talk about death and fighting. They really don't know what they're talking about, l mean, even the people who aren't cool with this whole thing, their main argument is 'C'mon guys, instead of killing them all, why don't we negotiate.'" Tball could hear the disgust in King's voice.

"They talk as if they won't suffer any casualties, it's fucking stupid! They're just so. ." Kingster struggled for the right word. "Ignorant!"

"King, just calm down. These guys are definitely NPC based on the quest that man in the Head Office gave me. Which means their not real people, as soon as we get out, we'll just leave them to their war." Tball Skulls said in a calm/subdued manner.

"How do you know we'll get out?"

"l don't, but we have time from what we've been told. As long as we get out of here before things go to hell, we'll be outta here and fine." Tball responded.

The pair sat in silence for a minute, no words passing between them. "We never did find out how to get a hold of the guys." Tball didn't have any way of placating Kingster's thoughts, so he opted for staying quiet.

 _The darkness of this dungeon is good for something after all._ Tball thought to himself in bitterness.

_GDFO_

The brown-haired man walked aimlessly through the dense fog and trees. He'd already bitten his lip raw from stress and was tempted to get started on his nails. The giant trees gave off the impression of California Redwoods and they were almost the same color. Deep brilliant red, with orange leaves and vibrant yellow everything else.

 _Even the Jungle lmpache around here are yellow._ Charles 'Bendazi' Rancliff thought to himself. So far, Bendazi had already killed nearly a dozen lmpache since arriving in this place the night before last, when he'd appeared, away from his friends and just about any time of sentient life. Bendazi looked up to the Sun, even though the Options Menu has a clock the man has taken to checking the Sun as well. Might as well know the difference between noon and three in the afternoon just by looking right? Not like he's doing anything better.

Daniel had been walking aimlessly for what feels like forever. Marching in one direction through the unending fog and trees, "Greeeeeeh!"

And Jungle Impache, can't forget about the Jungle lmpache. Bendazi took the time to kill off another level one monster with his bow and arrows, compliments of his secondary Archer class. "If l could eat you guys, l would." Daniel's face was deadpan as the beast burst into red polygons.

 _Bet you'd taste like chicken too._ Bendazi thought to himself as his stomach growled. Taking a break, he flopped under a tree and checked to see if the logout button is still missing, sighing at the obvious answer, the man took a few minutes to rest. He lied there listening to the Impache bicker and argue with each other out in the trees, some had decided a long time ago that he's just too much of a hassle to try killing. While others -like the poor guy that just died- still seem to think that they might have some luck.

Bendazi sighed before climbing to his feet. "Back at it again, l guess." As Bendazi rose to his feet, he heard a sound foreign to the rest. Distant and clumsy. Whatever it is, it has more than two legs, and bears much more weight to it than a typical lmp. Instantly on alert, Bendazi froze.

"Why didn't l catch this sound earlier?" Daniel dulled out the forest ambiance and willed his heart to stop beating in his ear. The noise, whatever it is. _ls getting closer!_

Bendazi climbed the tree he was once lying against and waited. Whatever it is, it'll pass and depending on how it looks, he'll either try to kill it for food, or hide until it goes on its way. Worse case scenario, the creature spots him and also has the potential for flight. Adjusting his glasses and sweeping his short hair back, Charles 'Bendazi' Rancliff waited for his nightly entertainment to pass.

_GDFO_

Thrum and Houten ambled along like a pair of dumb-drunk horses with a missing leg respectively. Houten had been supporting Thrum's left side slightly, making sure the guy doesn't topple over. Since getting up earlier today, they've been seeing nothing but milky-white fog.

"Sorry about this again, Murphy." Thrum apologized, looking to his shorter friend.

Houten nodded in response, "Just be happy that TP took me with you."

"For real, that's one of my worst fears. Being unable to move, with things trying to eat you in the night." Thrum conversed.

Houten stayed silent, not hearing Thrum's words. Taking his opportunity, the older male pulled out of his younger companions arms and stretched to full height. Feel his muscles and tendons scream in protest Thrum grimaced. Standing at full height, he forced himself to walk through his own power. And took the time to notice that Houten had in fact not even realized that Thrum's weight had disappeared.

 _Especially quiet._ Thrum opened his mouth to speak, but Houten beat him to it.

Not even looking in Thrum's direction and simply staring out into the impenetrable fog, Houten asked Thrum the question that had been weighing on his mind all day.

"Do you think we'll get out of this red forest. ?" Houten asked passively.

Thrum studied Houten's blank face, the question is appropriate but off somehow. Deciding to answer truthfully, Thrum said, "Fuck knows."

Houten looked to Thrum without even a half-smile at the crude joke and turned back forwards, not finding the answer to his silent questions in Thrum's gaze apparently. "Are you afraid you'll never see Sarah again?"

Json looked at Murphy in shock, all day they had a sort of gentleman's agreement in not talking about The Crew. _Murphy. . ._

"Murphy. If this is about a girl, you know you can tell-" Thrum's body tensed at his _Sixth Sense,_ an interesting skill Thrum realized he'd had all along while walking with Houten, and stopped walking to identify the threat. _Houten hasn't realized yet, better say something in case our enemy attacks._

Thrum jerked suddenly to dodge the attack he could vaguely feel from above and as he did three things happened nigh simultaneously, Houten stopped walking because he realized that Thrum had stopped moving, Thrum clinched in pain from his jerky movements, and a figure in a green-blue cloak dropped down on Thrum from above. Slamming the latter into the ground back first.

"AAAAARGH!" Thrum yelped in pain.

Houten drew his sword in one fluid motion and advanced on the demon from behind until a familiar voice cut his ire short.

"Json?!" Said the _person_ who fell on top of his injured comrade.

_GDFO_

"So, you just drop down on any guy walking by with good enough looks, huh fam?" Thrum asked as the group of now three hiked their way.

"No actually, l only drop from that high on the people who look ugly ugly, like straight ugly guys, l don't even do what l did to you to the lmpache." Bendazi replied, and then proceeded to die of laughter at his own joke.

"Funny." Thrum deadpanned.

Houten smirked at the banter, but kept to himself. The question about Sarah was unwarranted and absolutely not needed in his mind. lt's _just. . l wonder if Merida and her friends made it out alive, let alone The Crew. We don't need that weighing on our minds right now and drawing attention to it will only cause in-fighting among us. You may of re-cracked Json's healed ribs Daniel, but if l was left alone with Thrum for much longer his mood would of ended just as bad as mine._

"Bro, why are you still holding your chest like it's going to fall off?" Bendazi asked Thrum, half joking and half concerned.

"Well, if one asshole didn't come flying out of the trees like Tarzan," Thrum paused to let his painful half-chuckle pass, "But on a real thought, if you take a heavy hit then even after your health regenerates you still retain some of that soreness, at least for a little while. The pain should of passed by the end of today but-"

"Yeah, listen, I'm sorry man, l thought you guys were a monster l could. . . Eat." Bendazi's stomach growled and Thrum's and Houten's answered in kind. The group started walking forwards in search of food.

"We really need to find a damn town, or village, or something to munch on. This is bullshit! All I've seen is damn trees and land clouds!" Thrum groused.

Daniel opened his mouth to tease the 'land clouds' bit, but when his stomach protested the potential waste of energy, he clammed up and increased his pace. _Hell or high water, we're eating tonight._ Bendazi swore internally.

_GDFO_

The manly trio pressed their hunger march deep into the night. Killing lmpache on the way and even finding an Alpha at one point. The monster only dropped a damn spell tome for creating minor fogs, suffice to say no one was happy with that outcome. It was near midnight that the group of guys struck a lucky vein. Guided by it's lights before smells and sounds, the trio managed their way into Saleem. A town partially embedded into the side of a mountain.

The town's made of mostly granite and redwood from what Thrum could tell, but that mattered less to him than the buxom elves that inhabited this town. And the architecture meant even less to him when their group of men were offered a free dinner, being the first non-elves to enter Saleem in nearly a decade.

"All we have to do is pledge ourselves to the laws of your Theocratic government and we can eat?" Houten asked the village elder while eyeing up the feast laid out in front of himself and his friends.

"Why, of course, as long as you adhere to our rules you may stay and feast upon our bounty as long as it takes for your friend to make a full recovery." The not so elderly looking elder said, nodding her head vigorously and making her assets do amazing things.

Thrum and Bendazi, instead of staring holes in the food, stared holes into other things. A lot of things, all standing around them, as they sat at a table in the public eating hall. "Json, never get better." Bendazi said out loud.

"Noted." Thrum replied, for the first time regretting the fact that he's in a relationship. Albeit only a slight regret. _Ah, those who wait shall be rewarded._ Thrum thought to himself, buckling down to enjoy his first meal in a day or so.

_GDFO_

The group of amateur diplomats wandered for a day or two, passing through port town after port town. Looking for their remaining friends, after a week or so, news of a player constructed city began to pop-up. NPC talking erratically about the plan, hinting to anyone with enough care to hear about different things like player and NPC population requirements. Land, food, and water requirements, etc.

Word is as many players that can manage their way to this ideal spot for a city, the faster it can be built. And if rumors are to be accepted, then the magnitude of a player-created town/city is much more great than a generated NPC one, so to find their friends more than to help with this city project, the group of four made their way to the center of the world. Where this monstrosity will be built.

Interestingly enough, in a world devoid of maps and compasses, besides those specific to a documented region by that regions locals, every NPC of a certain knowledge of world events knows exactly where to go to find this mega-quest city. On their way to their destination, the black male asked the brown haired male a question that left everyone in the group skeptical about this project working. An essential question that nearly everyone in the group had been avoiding since the reality of this world became apparent.

"Do you think this player city will survive without safe-zones?"

"Are there even safe-zones in this world?" The brown-haired male replied. In the original death game they existed, but thus far not one has been encountered.

"To my knowledge, no. But we've only been in here for a week and a half, maybe we just need to give it some time?" The first man asked more than said.

"Your guess is as good as mine, big guy. Though to be honest I really do wish that there'll be one over every major city in this world."

"Even if there aren't well just have to move forward, we've been threw this song and dance." The group nodded at the black haired male's voice, bolstering their resolve. With that fleeting conversation the last vestiges of doubt left their minds, they're going to find their friends. Even if it means going through another great hall massacre.

_GDFO_

 **Hey there. First things first sorry for the super late update, after last chapters mediocre size l didn't want to push out another weakly sized chapter, even if it meant l was on time. Things have been a bit busy over in these parts, so I'll have to make the chapters a once every two week phenomenon. Besides all that, if you're confused about the last little break in a few of the chapters here (Chapters 1, 4, and this one 5 for sure have them.) then don't worry too much and tear your hair out, it'll be explained at some point. But you do get virtual cookies if you can guess right in a review.**

 **Furthermore (lol furthermore), l guess l can drop the hint on a couple things from chapter one. If you don't want the hint, then skip on to the next paragraph. HINT: I recommend looking up the significance of October 7th in the SAO Universe, and then re-reading Chapter 1.**

 **Please review, and big thanks to AwesomeA909 for the beta work.**

 **Uploaded October 24th, 2016**

 **Updated November 4th, 2016**


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